paper vs. plastic

Before Rohan was born, L and I decided to do what we could for both the environment and Rohan's health by avoiding disposable diapers. We went out and bought some reusable cloth diapers, set up diaper pails to soak the dirty ones in, tried to figure out how it will all work, etc. However, the prospect of using a giant safety pin to secure them had us pretty scared off the subject. So we looked around for alternatives. In our childbirth class they showed a few we thought would work well (with velcro tabs), but they cost around $10 – 20 each…which seemed like a lot given that we might need 15 – 20 of them.

When L's mom came in, she brought a number of cloth diapers from India. With these it’s a bit of a two step process. One is to tie the diaper on, and the other is to wrap the baby's bottom in a plastic sheet so everything else doesn’t end up dirty or wet since the diapers are not a snug fit. For the first few days after Rohan came home – this worked out okay. But the increased volume of laundry grew problematic. Since the cloth diaper was holding virtually nothing in, nearly all of Rohan’s few clothes were in the wash constantly.

The problem lay in the size of the cloth diapers (relative to Rohan) compounded by their meager absorptive properties. The diapers we had bought stateside were actually multiple layers of cloth and Rohan would get lost in all the fabric due to his size. So for the near term we have reverted to disposable. Which, honestly, are proving to be significantly easier to deal with. As Rohan gets a bit bigger, we will give the reusable ones another shot.

In the interim, we have found the Huggies brand of newborn diapers superior to those made by Pampers. Both are good for babies up to 10 lbs, and the hospital gave us a few of each. But now as Rohan starts to put on the pounds, the Huggies continue to fit him much better. To date we have not seen any rashes due to the breathability problems typically associated with disposable diapers. In terms of cost, we’re already rapidly approaching what we might have spent on the “expensive” cloth diapers. Each box of 40 newborn diapers runs around $10 and lasts about 3-4 days. And unfortunately, Costco doesn’t carry newborn diapers.