This is what happens when I forget to put the diapers out of Nathan’s reach. He flings them all over the room, every single time. And he knows he’s not supposed to… hence the “I’m sorry, Mama” look on his face.

No, we didn’t immerse ourselves in glittering rays of sunshine. Or win any money in the lottery. No, it was nothing fancy or even fun. That’s right. It wasn’t even REMOTELY FUN. Well, what on earth could we possibly have done this morning?

I’ll tell you.

WE CLEANED UP POOP.

Lots and LOTS of Nathan poop.

We had put Nathan in his play-yard for a bit, and before we knew it, he had pooped in his diaper. But it wasn’t just a regular ole poopy diaper, no sir-ee. It was a FULL poopy diaper. And Nathan decided he didn’t like it one single bit. So guess what he did?

HE PULLED HIS DIAPER PARTLY DOWN.

And I’m sure you can guess what happened to all the Poop That Was Once Contained. It was unleashed all over the play-yard. All over Nathan. All over his clothes. All over almost every single one of his toys. And this isn’t the first time we’ve had a Play-yard Poop Catastrophe.

So we spend a large chunk of our morning giving Nathan a bath, cleaning all his toys in the play yard (I’m not kidding when I say that only two or three of his toys, out of about 15 that were in there, were void of poop. The remaining toys all had a little dollop of poop smeared here or there), cleaning the play-yard’s mesh sides, and cleaning the play-yard’s floor.

Not a fun day, so far. Not fun at all.

Nathan is MUCH happier. Thank God. Because I really, REALLY don’t like to see my child in pain.

I sent Pampers an email and also contacted them via phone, and to their credit, the lady I spoke to was quite nice and apologized for the problem. I asked if they were thinking about taking the DryMax off the shelves and reverting to the old Cruisers (which we loved using on Nathan) but she said at this time, no they are not. In fact, they aren’t making any more diapers without the DryMax. Which is a bummer because I really liked the Cruisers.

I wish I knew why Nathan had such reaction to (what I felt was) the diapers.

All I know is that I change Nathan’s diaper almost immediately after he wets it. Paul and I have always been seriously on top of the whole diaper changes, which is why Nathan never, ever had a diaper rash of more than two or three little bumps that we were able to eradicate in a matter of a day or so. (Unfortunately, we can’t prevent diaper rashes 100% since we don’t know the very second Nathan wets himself, and with him being mobile and all, the diaper rubs against the wetness and causes mild rashes.) I was flummoxed when I saw the skin on his bottom turn bright red and starting to blister and even peel, something I had never seen before on him. It most definitely was not your average diaper rash. It was more like a burn than anything. And what really befuddled me was how quickly it worsened because I was changing his diaper within 5-10 minutes of him wetting himself. So I was at a loss as to why he had a this strange skin aberration in the first place, and especially worried about the severity of it.

I’m just glad I caught it before it got worse. I’m also appreciative that Pampers listened to what I had to say and documented my complaint. Hopefully, they can get to the bottom of this and fix it. Because the new DryMax technology would be pretty cool if they could figure out how to stop these painful reactions.

Not a bad diaper at all. It contains the poop, with the exception of an explosion here and there, and that’s all that matters.

So recently, we got a box of the new Pampers Cruisers Dry Max, which boasts ultra protection against wetness. Well, I’m not saying this with 100% certainty, but coincidentally enough, when we started using the diapers with the “dry max technology,” Nathan started experiencing painful symptoms.

Remember how just the other day, I talked about Nathan suddenly developing an aversion to getting his diaper changed? Complete with thrashing and wailing and flipping and flopping?  Well, it turns out that it wasn’t an aversion to diaper changes themselves. I think it was because he was having a reaction to the diapers.

And I don’t mean like a diaper rash with the little bumps.

I mean that it was something akin to a chemical burn. After only a week or so of using the new diapers, Nathan’s poor little bottom started turning red, so I assumed he was just developing a diaper rash. Only the redness kept getting worse and worse, and applying diaper cream made Nathan shriek in pain. And just yesterday, his screaming when I changed his diaper escalated into panic mode, and I noticed that the skin on his bottom was on the verge of blistering. Some of it was even starting to peel. And then, I came across this article in the news.

So we quit using the new diapers and started using the Baby Dry again, and instead of using diaper cream, I’m using Baby Petroleum Jelly. He doesn’t mind so much when I use the petroleum jelly, but he screamed bloody murder when I tried using our normal diaper cream.

Again, let me reiterate that I’m not 100% sure that it was the new diapers that caused this reaction, but as a precaution, I thought it was worth mentioning just in case any other mamas notice their babies developing a rashlike burn after switching to a new diaper. IF there is a connection, then hopefully, other parents out there will catch it before the rash/burn develops into something more serious.

But this poop? This poop will haunt me. This poop will be in my nightmares for a long, long time to come.

See, I had put Nathan in his play yard because I needed to get some things done, and because Nathan gets into EVERYTHING, there is absolutely no way whatsoever I can leave him unsupervised with free rein of the room.

Apparently, he pooped soon after I put him in his play yard.

And this poop could not be contained by the diaper. He was wearing a two-piece pajama set, and the poop ERUPTED out of the diaper and up his back.

And for the first time, he didn’t cry to let me know he needed a new diaper.

Instead, HE ROLLED AROUND IN IT.

HE.

ROLLED.

AROUND.

IN.

IT.

My husband got to Nathan first and, bless his wonderful heart, proceeded to start the PEELING process. You know, the act of PEELING all that poop off of Nathan that had EMBEDDED ITSELF into his skin from him rolling around in it.

I walked in to help, and I was about KNOCKED OFF MY FEET by the smell.

Oh that smell. The smell of a thousand sewers mixed into one giant vat of Pure Stink. It was so noxious that I FELT MY EYEBROWS SINGE just a little. The smell was so foul that it seemed to SOLIDIFY in the air. As I walked to the changing table to help Paul, I envisioned these minuscule Poop Smell Particles floating around, invading my nostrils and covering my skin.

It smelled… thick.

I tried not to breathe.

It didn’t work. I had to breathe, so I put my shirt over my nose and mouth… but the smell still managed to penetrate my meager defenses.   

There was poop all over Nathan. ALL OVER HIM. It was on his arms, his legs, his ankles, his stomach, his back, and even UNDER HIS FINGERNAILS. But that was nothing compared to what lurked in his play yard.

The play yard was GROUND ZERO.

A POOP CATASTROPHE.

A calamity of unsurpassed proportions.

There was poop on every single one of his stuffed animals. It coated every single one of his toys. It was smeared all over the floor of the play yard and a dull brown sheen coated his book and all its pages. It was even ENMESHED in the mesh-sides of the play yard.

EN-FREAKING-MESHED in it.

It was like a bomb filled with poop had exploded in the play yard, and globs of poop were strewn about all over the place.

My so-very-awesome husband cleaned and sanitized the entire play yard, all Nathan’s toys, and the changing table, which took over half an hour. (Seriously, could I have possibly ever married any one else even half as wonderful as this man? I don’t think so!) This poopage was monumental.

MONUMENTAL, FOLKS.

If only there was a diaper out there that could contain Nathan’s poops… but I don’t think they make anything strong enough.

Nathan needs INDUSTRIAL-STRENGTH diapers.

And it can be really frustrating, I think mostly because Nathan has all these emotions and feelings but he has no way to communicate them. One minute, he’s my sweet little guy… all smiles and dripping drool. The very next minute, he’s like an animal… howling, screeching, pinching, smacking, and simply being defiant.

And it can be over something as simple as feeding him something like pears.

It doesn’t matter that yesterday, pears were his favorite food. Because today, they are NOT his favorite food. And I’m his mother, so apparently, I’m supposed to be his personal mind-reader, because he acts like he simply CANNOT believe that I would have the utter audacity to GIVE HIM PEARS.

And don’t even get me started on diaper changes.

He used to be fine with them. Then one day, out of the clear blue, he suddenly turned into this wriggling snake-like being who defied the changing-table restraint straps like a force to be reckoned with. What used to take only a couple of minutes has now turned into a battle of wills.

Nathan does not want his diaper changed.

I do.

So he twists and contorts and screams, and I coax and cajole and try to be as fast as I can.

And when Nathan and I are just hanging out and playing, sometimes he’ll push me away when I try to hug him. I try not to take it personally because, hell, he’s only a year old and has no concept of other people’s feelings. But when I bend over to hug him or pick him up and he pushes me away, I can’t help but feel like little pang of sadness.

My baby wants to be independent.

And when he’s in the floor playing with the toys that surround him, he’ll suddenly get upset for whatever reason. And he will slap his toys away, throw his arm dramatically over his eyes, and cry while intermittently peeking out from under his arm to make sure I’m watching this spectacle.

But he also has his really sweet moments… moments that make my heart swell up with so much love that it feels like I’m about to float away on a wispy cloud of pure bliss. Like when we wake up from a nap and he rubs my cheek every so gently.

With a hand coated in slobber.

But then he forgets he’s supposed to be gentle when touching my face and will smack me out of sheer… love. Can you believe it? He loves me so much that he gets super excited and starts smacking my face. I tried explaining that domestic violence isn’t how you show love, but of course he doesn’t quite get that concept.

Sometimes he even tries to yank off my lips. AS IF THEY ARE DETACHABLE.

It’s absolutely amazing watching him grow. A year ago, he was 100% dependant on me for every single thing. Now? Now, he’s becoming a little more independent each day. I’ve watched him grow from this helpless little being into someone with his own personality and his own wants and needs. I’ve watched him learn how to roll over, how to sit up, how to crawl… and I cry a little (JUST A LITTLE) each time he masters a new skill.

And nothing beats when he wraps his little arms around my neck and gives me a hug or nestles into my hair.

Ah, living life with a one-year old. It’s never, ever dull. Or boring.

Last night, that future was revealed. I did not like what I saw.

Nathan woke up, so as usual, Paul got him up and took him in his room to change his diaper. Then he turned on the light.

That’s never a good sign.

“Honey?” he called. I popped my head up from bed and looked at him through the hallway. “Will you come here? I need your help,” he said. He was holding Nathan, clad only in his diaper, at arms length. I plodded into the room.

“Here, just hold him,” Paul said. “I need to wipe him down. He pooped all over himself.”

I held Nathan while Paul wiped him down and while I was holding him, I looked on the changing table and saw the soiled sleeper Nathan had been wearing.

It was completely saturated in a mixture of pee and poop.

Both of the sleeper’s legs, the feet, the entire bottom, and half-way up the back were were this disgusting brownish-yellow color.

“What the…?” I said as I peered down at the mess, horrified.

Apparently, Nathan had pooped at some point in the night without waking up. Then he peed on top of it. The pee had soaked into the poop, causing it to turn into this noxious, liquid mess that oozed out of both sides of the diaper, drenching himself and his sleeper in a vile concoction of waste. Horrified, I handed Nathan back to my husband and gingerly picked up the contaminated sleeper with my thumb and index fingers of my left hand.

I still had no idea what was in store for me.

I took the sleeper into the kitchen, set it in the sink, and started hosing it down with hot water. I watched as the water draining off the sleeper turned brown. Then browner.

Then these CHUNKS OF POOP started gushing out.

I started to sweat. I didn’t want to know why chunks of poop were now decorating the bottom of the sink. I gingerly snapped open of the legs.

Idon’twannaknow Idon’twannaknow…

“HOLY SHIT! PAUL! PAUL! THERE ARE MEGA-TONS OF POOP STUCK IN THE LEG OF HIS SLEEPER!” I screeched as soon as I saw what was inside. And I wasn’t kidding. The entire leg was completely filled up with soggy chunks of Nathan Poop.

Stinky, sticky, noxious, stomach-turning chunks of poop.

“Oh disgusting!” I cried as I carefully turned the leg of the sleeper inside out. My stomach started to roll.

I gagged.

I doused the leg with a blast of hot water, averting my eyes towards the ceiling. I tried to steel my stomach against images of poop cascading down the drain. But blasting poop out of the leg of a sleeper is like watching a train-wreck… you try your hardest to turn your eyes, but you can’t help yourself.

You have to witness the mayhem.

I looked down.

“PAUL! PAUL! FOR THE LOVE OF ALL THAT IS HOLY, THERE IS POOP COMING OUT OF THE OTHER LEG, TOO!” I shrieked.

I was in a Poop Nightmare. The worst poop in all of Poop Land. A sea of unrelenting poop. Mountains of soggy chunks of poop filled up BOTH LEGS OF THE SLEEPER. How does this happen?

Where does Nathan store all this? Does it pile up inside his little body all the way up to his head? Because I’ve never, ever seen so much poop come out of someone so little. So I delicately turned the other leg inside out and blasted away the poop with more hot water.

This is my version of Hell. Being accosted by mountainous piles of poop. It was all over the sink, all over my hands. There was so much poop that it had practically developed its own entity. It was taking over my mind.

After Nathan, his swing, his clothes, the sink, and myself were all cleaned up, we went back to bed.

Visions of poop haunted my dreams.

This, my friends, was the Master of Mega Poops. It was awful. Mega Poopage Awful.

I’ve noticed that the older Nathan gets, the harder it is to change his diaper.  When he was a newborn, he laid still… making diaper changes easy. I had no idea what was in store for me. Now, his legs are all over the place. If he’s not attempting to completely consume his entire foot, he’s wrapping his toes around my hair and trying to yank even more of it out of my already balding scalp. (My hair has to stay in a ponytail at all times… if his hands aren’t grasping for it, then it’s the feet I have to look out for.)  He flops around, rolling from one side to the other with his fists up in the air. Then, once I successfully remove the soiled diaper, he clamps his legs shut, crossing them at the ankles and preventing me from getting a new diaper on him. Sometimes I just have to stop and stand back, waiting for him to tire out just so I can finish changing his diaper.

Of course, Nathan thinks all this is very, very funny. Me, not so much.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZXL4_snbKPE 

Nathan telling the camera all about the peeing incident

My son woke up from his nap crying, so my husband (being the generous husband that he is) attempted to change his diaper.

That’s right, I said attempted. 

Paul laid Nathan down on the changing table and removed his soiled diaper under the misconception that once Nathan pees, he won’t pee again for at least another five minutes. So there Nathan was on the changing table, laughing and flapping his arms in the air when all of a sudden, a perfect arc of pee shot out and drenched Nathan, the changing table, and the floor… miraculously missing my husband my mere inches. The surrounding area was sparkling with droplets of pee everywhere.

And somehow, my husband had a surprised look on his face.

“Nathan’s not done this in months!” he exclaimed. Well, that’s because we’re normally really quick about diaper changes. Before we take the soiled diaper off, we make sure the Velcro tabs on the clean diaper are open and that the diaper is unfolded. As soon as we remove the soiled diaper, we scoot the clean one underneath him.  

But for some reason, my husband had a momentary lapse in judgement. He thought he had enough time in between pees to take off the old diaper before the new diaper was poised and ready to catch any impending disasters. But once again, Nathan proved him wrong. That little guy pees so much, however, that I’m actually surprised it hasn’t happened sooner. There have been times where I’ve changed five wet diapers in the span of only two hours. He’s like a fountain of pee… eternal., never ending streams of pee. I can’t even tell you how many diapers I have changed since Nathan’s birth. Probably billions. And that’s not even counting the number of times I’ve been peed on from leakage, putting the diaper on wrong (click here to read that story), and not getting the diaper on quickly enough.

I had no idea babies could pee so much. And before Nathan was born, I would have never in a million years thought I would be discussing baby pee…