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Your Personal Guide to Developing
Diaper Free Confidence
Here's How To Get The Most
Out Of Your
Part Time
Diaper
Free
Experience
Welcome!
With
Part Time Diaper Free, you have a self-paced, structured yet
flexible 'guide' to gaining EC confidence that you can read and review at
your leisure. Incorporating the suggested activities into your daily life
over time will help you to achieve diaper free confidence as you learn WITH
your baby, and have fun as you enhance your connection.
To
guide you as you get started on your unique EC journey, there are ten
modules, each with three simple activities to incorporate into your usual
day - whenever they suit you. These guided activities will give you a
simple structure to follow as you gain experience in being part time diaper
free, and thus develop your diaper-free confidence.
You
can also access the 'bonus' guides for additional tips. The modules are
updated, so do check back for improvements.
The
first five modules are best followed in sequence. The final five can be
done at any time, in any order, as they cover helpful concepts, activities
or information and resources that are useful overall support for your
journey.
First
of all, your approach to practicing EC is important, so..
Set
Your Approach To Positive: Remember the Seven
Secrets!
The
Seven Secrets To Developing Diaper Free Confidence provide a broad
understanding of how EC works as an idea. They highlight those attitudes,
approaches and strategies which will ensure you are heading in the right
direction.
"Preparation,
I have often said, is rightly two-thirds of any venture." Amelia
Earhart
The 10 Modules Cover the Following...
Turn
On Your 'EC' Senses
Focus:
- Observation Skills and Considering Cues
The
Thrill Of The Catch
Focus:
- Positions to help your baby to 'go' in; catching wees and poos by
simple timing strategies.
Tinkle
Time
Focus:
- Anticipating baby's need to go to the toilet and more timing options
We've
Got One!
Focus:
- Spotting Signs from baby that indicate a need to go.
 Check
your Compass
Focus: - Cultural reminder of how we are re discovering this
'lost' knowledge, and don't have a cultural legacy to draw upon,
which would make it easier.
Diaper
Free Adventures
Focus:
- Subtle Signs you can pick up by doing some simple activities with your
baby diaper free - safely.
Let's
Get Connected
Focus:
- Bonding Activities for fun and connecting with your baby, which will
help your EC awareness.
Building
Diaper Free Confidence
Focus:
- Extending Yourself by going outside the home with your baby diaper-free
- simple, safe strategies.
Finding
Your Comfort Zone
Focus:
- Balance is very important when practicing EC - three aspects
of finding balance are covered.
Moving Ever Forwards...
Focus: - Explaining EC to others, finding or building
support for EC, managing criticism.
Taking
it to the next level - Going
Diaper
Free?
Focus: - How do you take the plunge and go Diaper Free - at any particular age? What can you do to take the mental leap to
commit to a truly 'diaper free' lifestyle?
Each Module
will have the same elements to help you to work through them
easily...
'Imagine':
A mental primer to help you to get in the
'zone' for a positive approach.
Key
Ideas:
The main points covered in each module.
What
to Expect:
An outline of how you might feel while you are at that stage of
learning with your baby, how your baby may be responding, but emphasizing
the individuality of each parent - baby team.
Frame
Your Mind:
Your mind-set or approach is very important to keeping positive and
going in the right direction with EC. It can be easy to become
overwhelmed and lose confidence over a stage that is really common and
a normal part of the process. The Frame Your Mind paragraph offers a
suggested way of approaching each module.
What
to DO. Your Activities With Baby:
I'll highlight three specific tasks for you to do with
your baby - with suggestions like what to look for, steps to help
you learn a skill, or tips to consider experimenting with.
A
Suggested Affirmation:
A suggested affirmation or visualization to help you focus, remember
or gain a feeling of experience or confidence as you go through the
activities in the course. Have a go, or write your own to make them
even more powerful. "The
power of imagination makes us infinite." John Muir
Your
Mini Goals:
Re-phrasing of suggested activities as mini-goals; action oriented and
simple to read, remember and practice.
Learning
More:
There will be links to more information or extra resources on the
Internet that complement what you are learning and practicing with
your baby. You can explore further those aspects that intrigue you.
Your
Changing Table Guide to
Diaper Free Confidence
A downloadable 'Reminder' sheet, the
"Changing Table Guides" summarize each
module in an
A4 poster
to inspire you to action each time you change a
diaper.
Your Baby Watching Guides
A downloadable aid to 'Sign Spotting', the 'Baby Watching Guides' help
you to notice more about what your baby is telling you in a simple
strategy.
and
more is in development...
What
You Will NOT See in Part Time Diaper Free:
Ages
to begin or end each module.
Time-frames
to stay on each module.
Deadlines
for 'completing' activities.
This
is a personal journey of discovery and experience you are on with
another human being - your baby. You are a team, and babies live without
time! All the activities are suggestions for you to try out with your
baby, to give you various experiences to help you learn about EC with your
baby. Arbitrary pressures are not part of the process of EC - it is a
fluid, dynamic, individual process that does not respond to regimentation
and pressure - they are sure ways to burnout. EC is a benign approach
to toilet learning, centered on responding to the baby's needs.
That
isn't to say consistency isn't important - as it is to keep the lines of
communication open. It does not matter how long you work on each module with your baby, or how many times you do each activity, the more the
merrier.
So
long as the lines of communication stay open, you are building your
connection of love and trust with your baby, so they become secure and
independent as they grow. Take your time and enjoy the ride, use back-up
as needed. EC is a mind-set as much as a way of life.
Your
primary 'goal' is to strive to maintain or enhance your connection with
your baby, as your diaper-free confidence grows.
Think of Part Time
Diaper Free as a compass to help guide you through the cultural vacuum of practicing EC in which you probably exist, as you gain personal experience to make this lost knowledge your own once again. I know I found myself in a cultural EC vacuum
- I only found ONE person who was practicing EC in my state - and she was living about an hour and a half away from me! Meanwhile, I was saying to myself
"This is AWESOME - why doesn't everyone at least KNOW about it as an option,
so they can have a go now and then?" A near total loss of knowledge in the community was the reason.Â
You
can help rediscover this lost knowledge for yourself with your own baby.
Practicing
Elimination CommunicationAs you
practice in the coming days, weeks and months you will gain lots of
personal experiences and intrinsic knowledge specific to your lifestyle,
and your unique relationship with your baby. Think of each day as an
opportunity to practice observing, practice responding in time, practice
anticipating baby's needs. All of it is simply PRACTICE.
What
does practice mean? I'd select these interpretations to apply to the
practice of elimination communication, and going part time
diaper
free:
-
A
condition arrived at by experience or exercise.
-
The
exercise or pursuit of something.
-
To
perform or do usually.
In
time, this practice will inevitably result in new skills and in a gradual
reduction in
diapers
used, a general improvement in your communication and
understanding of your baby as they progress in their baby, imperfect way
from totally dependent in-arms supported pottying to independent,
self-initiated use of a toilet place. There is definitely no straight line
in this process from start to finish. It is more like rambling up a
twisting turning path on a hill - the goal is to more ever forward,
knowing they will get there with your help.
"The
journey not the arrival matters." T. S. Eliot
Tribal
Baby supports the Philosophies
of Elimination Communication as developed by Diaperfreebaby.org,
an international EC support organisation:
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The
Seven Philosophies of Practicing Elimination Communication
supported by the Tribal Baby Part Time
Diaper Free
online
course:
-
Babies
are aware of their elimination needs from birth and
communicate about those needs through various vocal and bodily
signals. Within the first few months of life, babies have the
ability to consciously release their bladders and bowels. By
taking them to appropriate elimination places during infancy,
we enable them to maintain a connection with their bodily
sensations and learn from an early age what to do when they
experience those sensations.
-
Elimination
Communication should always be gentle, non-coercive,
and based on babies' interests and needs.
Communication is the most important aspect of Elimination
Communication, and should be the focus.
-
Elimination
Communication is begun in infancy - starting
as early as possible is recommended. After one year,
Elimination Communication principles can be applied to toilet
learning.
-
Elimination
Communication can be done using diapers all of the time, some
of the time, or not at all. By reducing the number of diapers
used, Elimination Communication provides a more environmentally-sound
option than conventional cloth or disposable
diapering.
-
Prompt
loving attention to our babies' needs promotes strong
baby-parent bonds, fulfilling natural human
instincts. The bond of trust built through feeding and
comforting is strengthened when caregivers respond to the
baby's elimination needs. Elimination Communication helps
strengthen communication with our babies and is consistent
with Attachment Parenting practices.
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Have Fun Connecting,
Charndra
P.S.
I hope you enjoy practicing EC with your baby; it is a great way to learn
to communicate with a tiny human. Take your time, be always relaxed, smile
and keep practicing; let your baby show you the way to your instincts.
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