From time to time I figure out or, more likely, somebody shares a tiny bit of wisdom or a tip that is really, really helpful to me. Those nuggets are the kind of things I don’t want to forget and I want to share with others so they can benefit also. Here is one such tiny tip that has helped me lots with changing diapers on a squirming baby, especially a baby who wants to “help” me change the diaper by reaching down there.
Newborn babies may cry and kick (and occasionally “leak”) but that’s about all the trouble they make during diaper changes. As babies grow, though, they become more curious and more wiggly and that’s when diaper changing becomes more challenging, especially for those really dirty times. And that’s exactly when the reaching problem becomes very apparent and leads to dirty hands and then dirty clothes and then a dirty changing table and so on.
I wish I could claim this tip as my own, but no, I learned it from my wife who has changed far more diapers than I have. I was changing a squirmer one day and she warned me that he had moved to the reaching stage. She suggested I give him something special to hold during the diaper change. I was amazed at how well it worked. He was so fascinated with the new thing to hold that he completely ignored reaching into the diaper.
Now I try to keep something near the changing table that I can hand him. This trick seems to work especially well if the item is not one of his toys but something of mine that he rarely gets to hold. That fact increases the fascination level with the object in hand and decreases the squirming and reaching level. The usual result is that I’m able to quickly complete the diaper change. (Of course there are still moments where the baby reaches anyway and a gentle reminder of “no” and moving his hand goes a long way.)
So I hope this tip helps you out. Please share your diaper changing tips below because there’s got to be other great ones out there.