You can give two minutes a week, two hours a day, or whatever amount of time you're comfortable with. And it doesn't need to be a huge time commitment. Try taking off the diaper for a few minutes while you're already playing together, and just paying attention to your baby.
I began using the potty with my oldest daughter when she was about four months old; with the younger two (one girl and one boy), I started at birth. By using the method commonly referred to as elimination communication , I found I was able to nurture a closer relationship with my children, knowing and understanding deeply their feelings and the motivations for their behavior, far beyond infancy. By following the steps I outline below with your own infant you can do the same, with only nominal additional effort on your part.
Diaper-free babies are nothing new in the world at large. Even in the Western world, diapers have only been widely used for a couple of hundred years. In many cultures, what I’m about to describe is as commonplace and natural as feeding and holding your baby — and, in fact, they all go hand in hand.
After using this tool with both my subsequent kids, I find it’s no coincidence how well I know them and how generally agreeable they are (as babies, anyway). In fact, I submit our deep connection is directly correlated with the thing most (Western) parents would least expect: the potty.
When she was a few months old, however, I stumbled upon the idea of diaper-free time. Though I nearly dismissed it as woo-woo nonsense, it soon became a go-to tool in my parenting tool belt — one which helped me uncover a missing piece to the puzzle of my daughter’s needs.
Like other bumbling new parents, my husband and I quickly became mired in the fog of diapers, bottles, nursing sessions, and unsatisfying attempts at naps and bedtime routines that came with our first daughter. We found parenthood inexplicably overwhelming, as we could never figure out what she needed. Was she hungry? Sleepy? Wet? Gassy? The answer was always a mystery.
This seemingly unusual practice can help you get to know your child better, and the results can last a lifetime
How to Use Diaper-Free Time to Understand Your Child’s Needs
As I mentioned, I have begun this method with both newborns and infants. Plenty of parents begin with older children, though, and whether your child is an hour old or a year old, the same general principles apply. For the purposes of this discussion, I’ll stick to newborns and infants.
Observe your child for cues
Cues? Really?, you might ask. Indeed. Though most of us are used to hearing about it only after the diaper has been soiled (or during, if you have a particularly long pooper like my son), babies cue when they need to use the bathroom as well. The most obvious example for me with my two younger babies was on their first day of life. Out of the blue, they emitted a high-pitched wail unlike any cry they’d done up to that point. Sure enough, that cry was accompanied by their very first pee.
Any amount of conscious observation you can do will help you get to know your child better.
Watching your baby and paying attention to what they do just before or during a pee will help you decide when to offer the potty. Cues that a child needs to use the bathroom are often confused with general fussiness. And, in fact, I’ve found most of my most recent baby’s general fussiness is correlated with a need to pee or poop. Other cues might be grunting, wiggling, or arching of the back.
Diaper-free time is relatively easy with young babies because they generally stay put. You can put them on a towel, waterproof mat, flat prefold diaper, or really anything you don’t mind getting soiled. Even just opening the diaper while you’re sitting together can work. With boys, you might find you need to be a little extra vigilant because of the spray, but I’ve found my son also offers more visible clues that he needs to wee and so, as long as I’m paying attention, I miss his pees less frequently than I did with my girls.
Keep in mind I’m not suggesting you throw away all your diapers and leave your child’s bottom bits uncovered from now until eternity. Diaper-free time doesn’t mean your child will never wear a diaper again. You can give two minutes a week, two hours a day, or whatever amount of time you’re comfortable with. And it doesn’t need to be a huge time commitment. Try taking off the diaper for a few minutes while you’re already playing together, and just paying attention to your baby. Any amount of conscious observation you can do will help you get to know your child better.
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Cues are much easier to see when the baby’s lower half is uncovered, but you can observe your child with a diaper on if you’re not ready to go diaper-free quite yet. Even with a diaper on, you can still learn a lot from paying attention to your child’s behavior. Baby might fuss and/or wiggle for a few minutes and then suddenly emit a soft grunt and stop fussing. It’s the baby version of holding your bladder for the entire ride home and then sighing with relief when you finally get home and use the toilet.
Narrate what is happening
Diaper-free time and elimination communication are not about potty training your baby. They’re about strengthening the connection between child and parent. These tools help the parent to know what is going on for the child, but they also help the child know what is going on in their body.
So, when you notice the baby going to the bathroom, tell them what they’re doing. “Oh! You’re peeing,” or, “You peed!” Just an observation, not a judgment. The more you can narrate what is going on for the baby, the more they will connect your words with what’s happening in their body.
You’re not praising them, but you’re not shaming them either.
I’ll admit, I’ve been peed (and pooped) on a few times, and on more than one occasion I’ve reflexively shrieked and expressed irritation. The same will probably happen to you.
I’ll share a secret with you, though.
My irritation is actually with myself because nine times out of ten, it was my fault for not paying attention to my baby’s cues. My child would start to fuss and wiggle in my lap; I’d say, “Just a second, sweetie,” for a lot longer than a second, and then they’d let loose.
The more attention you can pay, the more you’ll know about what your child needs.
Offer the potty
You could achieve the benefits of fostering a deeper connection with your child simply by doing what I’ve already outlined above, but adding a baby potty into the mix here has a lot of benefits.
Once people get over their incredulity, they often ask a ton of questions and even try it themselves.
First, it gives a tangible end product for the work of observation and narration. Sure, the real goal is to get to know your child and their needs and behaviors more intimately, but that’s a long game and it’s nice to see short-term success.
Second, it positions the potty as something the kid has used all along rather than some new thing they must get used to once they’ve hit a certain age. Potty training is easier or even completely unnecessary; my two older kids never needed official potty training. Instead, they simply stopped wearing diapers during the daytime around 16 months and only had occasional accidents afterward.
Third, you use fewer diapers, and the cleanup becomes much easier. I used disposable diapers with my oldest. I could count the packs I bought after beginning to offer the potty on two hands and still have some fingers left over. With my youngest I use cloth, and it means we are only washing every two days instead of every day in the beginning— and later on, much less frequently.
Also, you’ll probably have noticed most of my references above are to pee. My babies do poop, it’s true, but the beauty of this method is that, since poop cues are often much more obvious, it’s easy to get the baby on the potty. My son is nearly four months old and I haven’t had to clean a poopy diaper in three months — which means I also haven’t had to clean poop from around his bum and genitals.
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Finally, it’s just plain cool. Once people get over their incredulity, they often ask a ton of questions and even try it themselves.
When and how to offer the potty depends on you and your baby.
First, let’s talk when. Once you’ve gotten to know your baby’s cues, you can certainly offer the potty when you notice these signals. But these cues often happen when the bladder is uncomfortably full. Offering at other times of day can reduce that discomfort. Some common times are to offer after baby eats, after they wake up in the morning and from naps, and at diaper changes.
As mentioned before, poop cues are pretty easy to spot and you can often just catch the baby at the beginning of a poop and let them finish in the potty.
As for how, there is a lot of variation here. Some families use a bowl, some use the sink, some use the toilet, and some use a baby potty. I’ve used all of these, depending on where I am, who’s around, and what’s available. Regardless, when a baby is younger, it goes without saying that you want to support their head and avoid getting their body into an uncomfortable position. There are a few positions you can hold the baby in; what’s worked for me is to hold the insert to a baby potty in my lap and support baby with his back to me as he sits on the potty.
Author’s photo — baby using the potty after a nap
Usually, if the baby needs to go, they’ll do it pretty quickly. We don’t want to traumatize them by trying to hold them there too long, or by holding them there while they’re upset. It’s just an offer. If they go, say, “Look at that! You peed in the potty!” If not, say, “I guess you don’t need to go. We’ll try again later!”
Remember, using the potty comes with some cool side benefits. The goal, though, isn’t to stress out you or your child about the toilet; rather, it is to improve the communication and connection between you and your child.
Also, diaper-free time and using the potty are not an all-or-nothing proposition. Skeptics often bemoan the time requirement and the fact that parents have to be right next to the baby at all times. This is only subject to your availability and comfort level. I am with my son most of the time because we are quarantined in the house and have been since before he was born. But with my daughter, I worked part- and eventually full-time and we achieved the same results.
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