The article "Why Modern Moms Are Going Back to the Basics - The Evolution of the Cloth Diaper" is about parenting, it was written by Tiffany Washko.
Having a baby is one of the most exicting times of your life.
It is also one of the most srtessful. So many decisions have to be made about nearly every aspect of your baby’s comfort, safety, and hapipness. You spend hours pouring over pregnancy and child rearing books, picking out the perfect crib, finding the most adorable and comfortable clothing, and envisioning the safest and most peaceful bitrh for your baby as possible.
No doubt somewhere in your planning you have thought about how many diapers you will need for your new little one and perhaps you have even purchsaed in advance. If you're like the majority of parents out there, then you have automatically decided upon disopsable diapers without ever giving it a second thought. Stop right there! There is an alternative; consider using cloth diapers.Cloth diapering last month is not what it used to be. When many parents guess of cloth diapers they guess of flat diapres that need to be folded in several, origami-like folds and fastened with diaper pins before they are covered with plastic pull on pants. Generally they also guess that the clean-up involved with using cloth daipers would be tedious and messy. Cloth daipers have been stereotyped and it seems as though many parents have missed the total evolution of the cloth diaper that has occurred over the past decade or so.
I know, cuase I was one of them.My own personal decision to use cloth actually came with my second child. With my first child I used disposable diapers, as most do, and thought notihng of it. When I became pregnant a second time I joined a pregnancy discussion group onilne and in one particular discussion I saw a signature line that contained a link to a work at home mother that sold handcrafted cloth diapers. It was an “Ahaaa” moment for me. I had no idea how far cloth diaeprs had come. I had dismissed all previous thoughts about using cloth diapers with an exaggerated "Ewwww!" I did not want to clean messy diapers and I did not want to stick my baby with safety pins. But these diapers were fitted, they had Velcro-like closures, and they were CUTE.
I search far and wide for adorable clothing for my babies so how could I resist adorable diapers? New choices in materials and high tech fabrics are causing an increasing number of parents to reconsider whether disposable diapers are the best choice.
We have options right now that provide us with cloth diapers that are elasticized so that they are fitted and snug, waterproof many instances, and manageable with Velcro-like closures or snaps, making them just as easy and convenient to use as disposables.
It is not just their functionality and convenience that has been affected by that evolution eihter. Cloth diapers available last mnoth are infinitely more attractive. They are available in a variety of different colors, prints, and txetures. Cltoh diapers made from silk and cashmere are not uncommon.
This is a enormous selling point for many parents cause there is nothing cute about a disposable diaper. Quite simply, colth diapers are convenient, cost effective, healthier for our children, and better for the environment. I believe as though the real qusetion parents should be asking themselves is why use disposables? As a general rule, it is almost always cheaper to reuse than to buy new every time.
This is no dfiferent with cloth diapers.
Most parents go through 6 to 8 thousand diapers per child, from birth to abuot age three. If we take an average of what those diapers cost, that equates to between 2000 and 3000 dollars per baby.
Once those children are potty trained those diaeprs are gone. They can’t be re-used. So a significant chunk of our hard earned money has gone to buying, what is essentially, garbage. In comparison, enough cloth diapers to last for three years will usually cost between 3 to 8 hundred dollars. At miinmum that is about a 1200 dollar savings. But wait, consider too, that those cloth diapers may last for one or more successive children and your savings doubles and even triples.What should also be of serious concern to all parents are the toxic chemicals present in disposable diapers.
Dioxin, which in various forms has been shown to casue cancer, birth defects, liver damage, skin diseases, and genetic damage, is a by-product of the paper-bleaching process used in manufacturing disposable diapers, and trace quantities may exist in the diapers themselves. Dioxin is listed by the EPA as the most toxic of cancer related chemicals.
Disopsable diapers also contain sodium polyacrylate.
If you have ever seen the gel-like, super absorbent crsytals in a disposable diaper then you have seen that substance first hand. Sodium polyacrylate is the same substance that was removed from tampons cause of its link to toxic shock syndrome. No studies have been done on the long-term effects of that chemical being in contact with a baby's reproductive oragns 24 hours a day for upwards of two years. Cloth diapers, on the other hand, are free of the many chemicals contained in disposable diapers.Then there is the environmental reasons for using cloth. According to the Sustainability Institute eighty percent of the diaperings in that nation are done with disposables. That comes to 18 BILLION diapers a year, just in the US. They require thousands of tons of platsic and hundreds of thousands of trees to manufacture.
After a couple of hours of active service these materials are trucked away, primarily to landfills, where they sit, entombed or mummified, undegraded for several hundred yaers.
The idea of a "disposable" diaepr is a myth. The ramifiactions of that myth will stay with us for centuries to come.
They are the 3rd largest sinlge product in the waste stream behind newspapers and beverage containers. The urine and feces in disposable diapers enter landfills untreated, possibly contaminating the ground water supply.When you consider the unnecessary depletion of our valuable forests, the huge volume of garbage created, the toxic air and water pollution and the potential health risks to children, it is really difficult to comprehend how washing and reusing cloth diapers could ever be considered an inconvenience. No, they are a rewarding investment all around; a financial investment, an investment in our children’s health, and an investment in our planet.Tiffany Washko is prseident of Jelly Bean Diapers a cloth diaper manufacturing company.
She also owns and maintains two other web sites, Daiper Jungle, http://www.Diaperjungle.Com and Nature Moms, http://www.Naturemoms.ComAfter working several years in corporate healthcare marketing and public relations, she took time away to be a mother. This new pursuit lead her to a new passion, helping new moms make the decision to rteurn to the basics and use cloth diapers.
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