Cloth Diaper Question - Farmington,MO

You aren't going to get crucified. Your daughter is not physically ready to be dry at night. many MANY MANY kids are wet at night until they are as old as 10, 11 or 12. Heavy sleeping seems to be one of those trademark tell tell signs. They simply don't have mature enough muscles to maintain that control while sleeping. Once you accept that, it isn't quite so stressful. While I havve nothing against cloth diapers, I think you need to keep her in pull ups. Cloth diapers leak terrible when there is a lot of urine, so her sheets, blankets, clothes EVERYTHING will get wet. Her and all of her belongings and her room will eventually smell like stale urine. If you do choose this route, then put a rubber/plastic mattress cover on to protect her mattress. But my suggestion is to not make a big deal out of it, and just let it pass whenever it passes.

I agree with Robyn she is not going to learn to wake up if she feels wet she is just going to be wet and miserable. I would also use regular nighttime pull-ups. My DS was in pull-ups at night till he was at least 6.5

A lot of kids aren't fully night-trained until later... I remember going on sleepovers and the mother would put a plastic sheet under me! It didn't happen every night, but often enough.....

At this point, her body isn't mature enough to be dry at night... don't sweat it... just use the night-time pull-ups that are designed for her weight, and it should work fine.

Don't make her feel stressed about it, and things will go easier.

We use cloth full-time, and I agree with the other posters that there's really not a good cloth trainer product on the market that will hold all the urine a 5YO produces overnight. The cloth trainers available will catch one accident, but they just won't hold up for overnight for a child that size.

(the cost of using cloth have been wildly overstated, however, by posters who don't have a clue about modern cloth diapers)

Please use the search option on this page and look up all the answers already given on this topic.

You may want to consider that since she is delayed she is going to be wet at night for many years to come.

Cloth diapers will not hold her urine and will leak almost every night. So not only will you be making extra laundry with the daily diaper but you will also be making extra laundry from the bedding. Your laundry costs will go up. You will most likely add 1-2 extra loads of laundry per day, my time is worth something so I don't like the idea of adding all the extra work.

Plus you will most likely add the cost of 1/2 - 3/4 of a box more of laundry detergent per month, then add in fabric softener and dryer sheets. Your gas bill will increase due to the dryer running an extra hour per day, the electricity bill can go up from the extra wash cycle and dryer use too. The water bill can go up, granted this one may not be more than a couple of dollars but still, it can go up and every penny counts.

All in all, I just can't see paying more money per month to the utility company and laundry supply people PLUS making more work for myself so we can say we use cloth diapers.

Cloth is not less expensive when you start adding in the extra cost of the utilities, laundry supplies, and work put on one person.

Seriously, it will cost more. A box of over night pullups at Walmart is less than $20 and will cover the month. Even if she tears one when putting it on and uses more than one per night, it costs less to use disposable than it does to use cloth.

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A box of pullups-$about $20 at Walmart for enough to cover 30 nights.

A box of laundry detergent, about $15 plus 1/2 -3/4 box more, so $20 per month for laundry detergent. Estimate an extra $8 per month to add extra loads of laundry.

Extra electricity, gas, water....estimate an extra $7 to utilities.

Extra bleach, extra fabric softener, extra dryer sheets, estimate $5 extra for the process of cleaning the cloth diapers.

That makes your household bills going up approximately:
$8, $7, $5....about $30 extra per month to use cloth diapers instead of about $20 for a box of pull ups.

Then you add in the final cost of buying the cloth diapers, even though it is a one time cost, they are not cheap. So if you average that out over several months that add's up to $3 more per month for cloth diapers instead of disposable ones.

My time is worth something. I don't mind doing laundry. I enjoy it better than any other household activity. I like the feeling of taking the clothes out of the dryer and hanging them up, folding them, knowing they are clean and still look new.

I like doing laundry. AND I would never go to cloth diapers. I have a boy who routinely has accidents, just does not feel it coming out, and I can tell you that when I do a load of pee clothes I can smell the pee in my washer and have to sanitize the thing or smell pee in the next few loads too.

We have used the Huggies Overnight pullups with the Disney Princesses, ended up just getting one since both kids have accidents and he would not wear those, we ended up just using the ones with Buzz Lightyear on them. Now that the kids are bigger we started using the Goodnights since they went to a weight past the Huggies. The Huggies were still doing okay, he's 5 and she is 8, but they looked like bikini's on her.

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There is a chemical reaction in the brain that has to signal the kidneys to stop urine production when a person falls asleep. If that chemical reaction is not happening then there is nothing that can be done. Waking a child up is just cruel. It actually does nothing except make everyone tired and less likely to be able to do the daily things they need.

Agree that this is a physical problem and something she cannot help.. My mother had some waterproof flannel squares that she would use to layer - sheets and flannel, so the top layers could be stripped and thrown in the washer and a fresh sheet would be under that. made it easier to change bed in the middle of the night.

Okay, I have to completely disagree with those who have said that cloth diapers leak all the time and will not hold up over night with a heavy wetter. I have found the opposite to be true. I cannot find a disposable diaper that will contain my 3 year old daughter's nightly urine output. They always leak, and they always stink horribly in the morning. Cloth, on the other hand, NEVER leaks and doesn't stink as long as you have a good wash routine. I would agree that there really aren't any good cloth trainers on the market right now, at least none that are designed to accommodate heavy nighttime wetting. But there certainly are many nighttime cloth diaper options that work beautifully. Our bulletproof nighttime combination is an Organic Bamboo Fleece Fitted diaper under wool longies or shorties, both made by sustainablebabyish|sloomb (www.sloomb.com). I was intimidated by wool and didn't even try it until my daughter was 18 months old. I wish I had tried it sooner. It is so easy. And the fabrics are heavenly soft, beautiful, and (most importantly) functional. They are expensive, but not when you consider how much use you will get out of them. If you have any questions about these diapers, please feel free to send me a private message and I would be happy to answer your questions. I don't work for sloomb or anything, I just love their products. :) Also, I should mention that their fitted diapers come in a size XL to accommodate children who potty train later for whatever reason. My daughter is 38 lbs and 38 inches (quite a chunk) and we are still in larges.