Eliminating Communication

A few days ago L suggested we start toilet training the wee one. I was reluctant at first, but she made a very convincing case for it. She came across this idea called Elimination Communication, which is a pretty daft name for a form of toilet training. But I suppose DAUT was too obscure a backronym.

EC as a whole has a lot of pretty tweaked ideas, but at its heart makes sense – babies have to learn to defecate in their clothes, which they need to unlearn later. Take advantage of this before they get too used to sitting in their own yukky stuffs. The idea that the lass can be toilet trained now at 5 months is something I can heartily endorse. It could take months, but even one less nappy to change would be appreciated.

So we've been taking turns holding the girl on the toilet seat waiting for her to get the idea. As far as I can tell, so far she just thinks we're nuts and that she was perfectly happy going when and where she pleased. And why does she now have to sit on a cold hard chair, risking falling into a scary tub of water, while we sing to her and make excited faces encouraging something to happen. What. Do you want me to giggle? Cause, as far as I can tell, it's the only thing I'm doing that gets any positive response.

I bought a baby training seat for the loo to make the process a little less scary, but she's still not getting it. Well, plenty of time for her to warm to the idea. It's not like she's got any better places to be.

As a side note, this strikes me as yet another example of how the whole baby thing in our culture is just all wrong. Pregnancy, birth, feeding, transporting… the "normal" way of dong things seems to be the nearly the worst thing possible to do. So it would not surprise me at all if the expected way of doing nappies and toilet training is well off course.

Actually, I knew there was loads wrong about this culture before I even considered breeding. Why should common conceptions of childrearing be any different?

Scary illnesses

Yesterday the wee one came down with a tummy bug. It was really rather scary seeing it. I was at the grocery store with her in a sling facing out so she could enjoy the sights. Turns out, if I'm alone having her face outward is not a good idea. Beyond hearing her breathe and vocalise and holding her hand, there's no real sign to tell what she's doing.

So my first sign that something is wrong is she spits up and I rush to catch it with a muslin. But it soaks through and just doesn't stop coming. I turn toward the hand mirrors on display next to me, and I see her throw up again, this time out of her nose too. I get her out of the harness, sit her on the floor and clean her up. She's quiet, but not out of it. I can't tell if she feels nothing unusual's happened or she's upset and weakened beyond crying. I worry that, since it's cold out, I overbundled her and accidentally burnt her brain out.

I'm not putting her back in for the trip home. I just pick her up and walk quickly homeward. Her being sedate through the whole experience makes it worse. The world just cut out and there is just us, and blurry obstacles between us and home. 5 minutes and one panicked call later (she's not well, get the door) and I'm unbundling her on the bed. She seems fine. She's turned on her belly doing the cat pose. Then she surprises us by bawling unconsolably for half an hour. Something she's not done for ages.

L tries consoling her while I call NHS direct asking for advice. She falls asleep by the time I'm off the phone.

In the end, she throws up huge amounts two more times. I feel slightly better in that it's clearly not because I bundled her up too much. But worse too because she's clearly got something wrong. It's almost certainly due to her catching her mum's tummy bug (which we thought was food poisoning). They say it'll likely be over in 72 hours (40 more to go) and just make sure she doesn't dehydrate.

She did it again today while I was taking her down the stairs. Two very volumous vomits with stuff coming out her nose. That's still really weird to see – though it's also a good sign that something is Not Right. She seems to be coping better with it today – no 30 minute bawl session following the incident, just some patience while I run around shedding icky clothes, cleaning the girl, floor and whatnot.

So, it seems we just sit and wait and have towels at hand in case of more trouble.