I think elimination communication can contain an element of infant potty training -- potty training meaning a focus on training to use a potty. But elimination communication is so much more. The focus is on the communication around elimination and less on the training (in fact, I think every ECing mama can admit they have shifted into "potty training" mode, and when they do, it all falls apart -- they key is the communication). When I say communication, it's so much more than verbal, although talking about all of it is an important part, too. Communication is a reciprocal relationship, that more often than not, does not require words. It is a squirmy baby in a mamas arms, it's a grunt, it's being receptive to the preverbal language of babies, it's the awareness of when elimination is happening (the times we don't catch it) or when we just *feel* like it's going to happen. It's the tone in a mama's voice when she says, "Oh, you went poop!" It's seeing when the baby is interested or not, done or not, enjoying themselves or not. The goal is not to be potty trained (although that is a wonderful benefit) -- the goal is to *be* with your child during the process of eliminating, during the learning that surrounds living and a baby becoming more autonomous. Elimination communication is not a destination, but a journey. Using a potty is one way of a baby eliminating, diapers are another, and someone could get creative and find a million other ways! I say this because in American culture, we may see diapers as the default way and a potty as an alternative -- really, they are both just equal options of ways to eliminate. Elimination communication is just cultivating that awareness of peeing and pooping that babies are aware of from birth, and we use a potty as a means where the baby does not have to soil themselves or sit in their mess. Elimination communication is utter respect for the baby and their cleanliness. Elimination communication is the most respectful toward the earth as well, since their is no added waste (disposable diapers, or even laundering and/or shipping of cloth diapers and the inevitable disintegration of them). Elimination communication does require effort. It may not be for everyone. If a parent is dedicated to being aware of their babies needs and meeting them on demand, elimination communication will work wonderfully for them. If they have less time or energy to do this than 24 hours a day, a parent can do any middle version of elimination communication -- even part time EC benefits baby and parent :)) Even being a naked baby for an hour once a week has benefits :)
My story... I don't remember the first time I heard about EC, but I believe it was during my pregnancy with my youngest baby. I thought it was infant potty training. I thought it was baby conditioning (behaviorism style). I had been taught my whole life that it was bad to train a child to use the potty until they were old enough to know what was going on, to initiate it and do it themselves. But one thing kept nagging at me... It was these loving attached mama circles that I kept hearing about it through! That unreconciled bit stayed somewhere in my brain. When my baby was about 5 weeks old, one of my dear mama friends shared about doing EC, and I finally decided to be honest about my fears concerning it. I told her it sounded like training and conditioning (with sound cues and such), and she shared, "wow, it doesn't feel like that for us at all!" So, I checked out her links, and before I was even through the first page of the first link, I got it! I raced back over to the thread where my friend had shared about EC and shared my excitement. True to how I do things, I consumed sites and info for a week before taking the plunge :) I swear, Jai was like, "Finally!!! You get what I have been trying to say!!!!" A baby who had been pooping maybe once a week started pooping almost everytime I took her potty! She would smile when we I took her potty. She'd always hated diapers (so had my 2 oldest, but they acclimated to them, but Jai refused to), so she was diaper free almost immediately, and she would squirm when she had to go. At first, it felt too ironic, like maybe she just peed everytime I took her because my timing was so good or because babies always have to pee. But when I was busy and would miss her squirming, she would fuss and eventually start crying! She was like 6-7 weeks old at this time!! I was amazed every time. It felt amazing to me. I loved being able to leave her diaper free, knowing she would never get a diaper rash, knowing all that fresh air and soft fabric touching her butt was so healthy and comfortable for her. And she lived in dresses or just cute tops or pants/jammies with a slit between the legs, so she could stay warm and have easy access to use the potty the several times she needed to go as a tiny baby. I was amazed that she could hold it! I was amazed that she was sooooo aware (although, I shouldn't be -- babies are ultra aware of everything!). Following her lead (listening to what she wanted and didn't want and finding a way to make it work for me, too, in case there was an accident), she catapulted in those first 2 weeks into sleeping and waking dry, being dry on short car rides and shopping trips (I'd take her when we got there and right before leaving). She even had a week of night sleeping diaper free and waking dry (that ended the day I bragged about it in a thread in an online forum to my friends -- ah, irony). I knew she was made for EC. I had a lot of time to dedicate to her in those early weeks, as I, too, was still recovering from birth and so was not very active. Once I started getting up and doing long overdue deep cleaning projects, I missed signals from her and we had a lot more misses. I used a cloth diaper on her (or her on it), so I would see it immediately and could change it, and I talked to her about it, "Oh, you went pee, and I missed it, and you probably were trying to tell me, and I missed that, too. I'm so sorry. I will try to pay closer attention next time. You like to pee in the potty, don't you?" By that time the baby was usually smiling at me for talking with her for so long :) Life got crazier. My oldest went to Panama with my dad for a few weeks. I had a 2 year old (who, btw, I had applied EC techniques with and he learned to find awareness again and use the potty in a matter of a week or two). We hit an extremely crazy and hectic time in our life, and I had to strap her up in diapers, even when she protested :( This was at around 4 months. Being a single mama with 2 other kids and a too-big house made it difficult to take the time and energy to be as attuned to her as I wanted to be, and as I needed to be to catch every potty-tunity (as we call it :)). She still went diaper free a lot, but it was colder in the world and just not the same.
Fast forward to around 9 months old, I missed EC, I missed being attuned to my baby (in contrast to the running around life had in store for me), I missed not using so many diapers. I decided to get serious about being diaper-free. Diaper free is a state of mind, more than a physical measure. Diaper free means not being dependent on diapers. So, we took the diapers off. For almost 2 weeks, I cleaned up a lot of pee and was so very thankful for wood floors and increasingly warmer weather. She was naked at the park and on blankets in the sunlit living room. She wasn't signaling me like I was so spoiled by before. She wasn't demanding I take her potty, and I didn't feel like I had time to sit and watch her and wait for her. Upon news that we had to move, life got crazy again, and EC got put on the back burner.
2 months later, we were in a new place (tile floors), and I couldn't wait to feel settled enough that we could practice elimination communication. This new place was much smaller, much easier to be on top of and slow down and be with my kids. Baby was standing. Diaper free, when she would pee, I started using words to explain what was happening. She would notice she was peeing, could feel it go down her leg, make a puddle at her feet. I would say, "You went pee!" and (I learned after the first couple times) grab a nearby cloth to wipe it up immediately before she squatted down to splash in it! I did it a lot. I tried to look for her signals. I caught her about .5 seconds before she would go -- not earlier enough to take her to the potty. Sometimes we used diapers, sometimes she was diaper free. I wanted to get so serious, to put it on the forefront of my property list. Her birthday was coming up, she was cruising across tables and the couch. I was thinking about her birth one year before, I was feeling reinspired by my unassisted birth. I was channeling that new birth energy, and I bought her a potty for her birthday -- a symbol of my dedication to something she had so enjoyed before and I knew she would love again (still hated diaper changing -- I had to do it while she was upright), and a genius idea I had since I couldn't get her to the potty fast enough. She didn't know the potty's purpose, even though Noble loved using it, and I thought seeing him do it would help. I knew that if I could just get her to use the potty once, she would know it's purpose forever after, and she would be hooked! I just couldn't get her to pee in it!!!! I tried lots of things, and what ended up working was, upon waking in the morning, I put her on the potty on the counter between the mirror and the light switch, and letting her flip the lights off while we played a game with it. She was interested in sitting there long enough that she accidentally just peed! It startled her at first :) The sound, the whole sensation of it all. I cheered loudly, knowing that was all she needed :)) We sang a song about peeing in the potty and celebrated this new chapter in our elimination communication journey. I was right about her just needing to do it once. I didn't catch her cues while she was up and about, but after her nap, I set her on the potty and she went after a moment's hesitation. The next time, she went immediately. I was catching just-woke-up pees soooo easily. Then I started remembering to take her periodically between sleeping, and she started going more. At 14.5 months old, we miss maybe one or 2 pees a day, and for the last 2 weeks she has been waking dry so we are diaper free at night, too. She tells me when she doesn't have to go, by refusing to sit on the potty when I try to help her on (she can't get on alone), and now she will let me know by either going into the bathroom with me or not. She is naked almost every day, even in the freezing cold -- she doesn't want to wear clothes, either! Last park day, I took her to the potty every couple hours, and she had no misses :)))))) This is amazing!
Elimination communication is one piece of the life conversation we will have. It is a preliminary to discussions about our bodies and about sex and about our days and what may be ailing us. It is the beginning of awareness of our bodies and its workings and talking about it. It invites my older kids to talk about their bodies and those intimate and possibly embarrassing bits that are hard to choke out, even to a doctor. The style of elimination communication is the basis of the kind of communication that happens in attachment parenting and consensual living and radical unschooling -- that honest language and deep understanding and reciprocal flow and mutual feelers. I had a moment about a month ago, when this blog post first started taking shape in my head, where I noticed that that *thing* that is the difference between elimination communication and infant potty training is the foundation, the essence of connection: noticing the signals, responding to them, enabling the other person to do what they may need help doing. Elimination communication is not infant potty training, because it's purpose it not to teach to use the potty -- we have fun whether the pee is in the toilet or on the floor or in the carseat (that one takes more effort to not feel funky about). I trust that toilet learning is inevitable, given that we live in a society of toilet users -- I don't need to teach that, just bathe my baby in language and awareness of it, while she is learning :))
I would LOVE to hear your stories of your journey with elimination communication, and please feel free to post links to sites or other blogs on elimination communication :))
