Ripping off the joke “How can you tell if someone [fill in the blank]? Don’t worry, they’ll tell you!” it occurred to me that cloth diapering is much the same. We cloth diaper moms just LOVE to discuss our hobby/passion/obsession with anyone with 2 ears. Heck, even one ear will suffice. And if they have no ears we will start playing a game of charades with them to try and gesticulate why we love cloth diapers so much.
So what is it about cloth diapers that makes nearly every mom (and even some dads) feel the need to discuss them whenever possible? I think it all goes back to how earth shattering it can be on so many levels to discover such a fun “secret.” In some ways it does feel like belonging to a very cool secret club; except it’s a club you want everyone else to join too. There’s nothing like knowing a secret to make you want to TALK about the secret.
It is almost instantaneous. A mother starts using cloth diapers- suddenly she starts bringing it up in conversations with her friends about how much money she is saving, or how cute the diapers are, or even how infrequently they have to deal with the trash now that they are washing diapers and not tossing them out. Some moms take it to their message board friends for their “Due Date Club” on forums like The Bump or Cafemom. There are even some moms who are crazy enough to start blogging about their love of cloth diapers. I mean really… who does that? How much is there to say about cloth diapers?
We will go even farther… keeping the pants off of our children to show off the diapers in hopes that maybe someone will notice and ask us about them. If it is too cold we wear cool “I Love Cloth Diapers” pins on our diaper bags. We even start dressing our children in cute shirts that say “Cloth Rocks.” In playgroups we become “butt watchers” and try to decipher which babies are wearing cloth diapers. If none are then we decide to bring up the topic casually in conversation… “Oh you took your baby to Disney? We did that too and even packed our cloth diapers!.” See what we did there? Dropped the bomb.
We don’t do it to be “holier than thou” although I know that is what a lot of other parents think. “Geeze those cloth diapering snobs are always on their high horse about cloth diapering. Why won’t they shut-up and leave us alone?” My rebuttal to that is simple: there is nothing to discuss about disposable diapers except how to save money on them with coupons because you are buying them ever. single. week. So that is why there are never blogs about disposable diapers or disposable diaper advocacy shirts. It just doesn’t happen. Cloth diapering however is a whole ‘nother animal. There is so much to talk about so we do just that.
So don’t worry… if you happen upon a mother and wonder if she is using cloth diapers just giver her a minute. She WILL tell you. Or better yet, she might show you her baby’s butt… so watch out!
