© Sandrine New
Western societies have so integrated the model diapers (disposable, at that), it now seems difficult to envisage a another model.
Yet we alone in the animal world to need this artifice, which is also not universal. The Chinese, in particular, continue to find dirty leaving a baby to marinate in his own excrement, and continue to focus, instead, the "split pants" (thank you for the planet!). They practice, in this, what is rediscovered under the name Natural Hygiene Infant (HNI).
This approach, which can be put in place well before verbal communication involves being attentive to the little and offer him the pot (or a smaller vessel, adapted to its morphology) whenever he makes a wish. As the infant expresses his hunger or fatigue, he also expresses his need to eliminate, in its way: groan, grimace, stop its activity, how to kick ... In the adult to listen and offer the "pot" when the signal is detected.
This approach takes the cons-up of all that we said from the '60s: that the child is unable to control his sphincters before 18, even 24 or 36 months! One idea, however, strongly impacted by the industry of disposable diapers, which finds its case.
While the HNI is enough burden on parents, and we must accept the "accidents", the periods of "regression". The HNI may also be difficult to establish when the child is kept outside. But nothing prevents a layer that is then. The important thing above all not have performance objective, and not to be confused with the HNI's early training in cleanliness.
The environmental benefits are obvious, as well as economic benefits for parents. The benefits for the child are important too: do not wear layer, back to a greater freedom of movement, avoid irritation and is especially not to have any part of the body taboo, because hidden and locked at all times.
If HNI can be practiced from the first months of life, it is never too late to implement it. It may take a little longer with a healthy child used to wearing diapers, who did not used to signal its needs, but with a little patience, it remains quite possible. Anyway, he'll have to deal with the pot one day, so why not now?
Two books for further reading:
- Hygiene child's natural, life without diapers , Sandrine Monrocher-Zaffarano, Editions Youth, 2005
- Without layers, it is freedom! , Ingrid Bauer.
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