I never really thought of myself as a "Crunchy Mama". Well, at least until I took a quiz on Facebook to determine "How Crunchy are You?". Yes I breastfeed, but so do most of the women in my Family Hui (baby group). Yes I use cloth diapers, but so do many of the mothers where I live in Hawaii. Elimination Communication (EC), yep, I do that too! But wait, I could not think of any other mother I had met in person who practices EC. And I only got crunchier from there.... But hey, I carry a Petunia Pickle Bottom diaper bag, that is supposed to be baby-chic, right?
I suppose I was destine to take a natural approach to life in general, having grown up in a log cabin powered by solar panels in eco-conscious Sonoma County, California. My desire to take a natural approach to parenting was solidified when I began writing Natural Beauty Lifestyle http://naturalbeautylifestyle.
As I choose which direction to take on various aspects of parenting, I let nature be my guide. How would people have approached parenting before all the modern-day technologies and man-made products? What are the basics needed to raise a healthy happy child? Is a certain product or technique beneficial for my child, or are other parents using it simply because it's trendy or they saw a commercial for it?
Despite going against many of the mainstream norms, adopting a natural approach to parenting in our modern day society has been pretty smooth sailing so far.
Forgoing a Stroller and Wearing Baby, Instead
Before I had my own baby, the sight of a baby riding along the sidewalk in a stroller seemed perfectly normal. But after exclusively wearing my baby for the past 5 months, I wonder if the baby in the carriage is lonely and would prefer to be held close to his parent, up where he can see the sights.
The first time I questioned the need for a stroller was during our travels throughout Sri Lanka. I only saw one stroller the whole time we were there, and that was at the airport. How do parents in Sri Lanka manage without strollers? They simply carry their babies. And that made me think of the babies in India, who were worn in slings that seemed to be part of their mother's clothing. And the Hmong women always had their babies strapped to their backs in a carrier. The idea of separating the baby from its mother and having it ride in a stroller seems to be a modern Western concept. I prefer the idea of carrying my little monkey close to me.
My husband and I decided to start off with just a wrap and a soft structured carrier and wait to see if we felt the need for a stroller. So far, we are loving babywearing! I like keeping my baby close, where I can kiss the top of his head whenever I feel like it, reassure him when he is startled by a loud noise, and he can drift to sleep to the sound of my heartbeat.
Luckily, for me, it's pretty easy for a babywearing mama to fit in here on Oahu. Most of the ladies in my parenting group use both a stroller and a carrier or wrap. Babies usually show up to play dates in their strollers and leave at nap time snuggled close to Mama in a carrier. The majority of tourists here are Japanese, and they are commonly seen pushing their shopping bags in a stroller, while wearing their baby in a carrier.
So as long as my baby and I are both enjoying the babywearing arrangement, I will continue to tell my mother-in-law, thanks for offering to buy us a stroller, but we really do not want one.
Skipping the Disposables and Going Straight to the Potty
One thing my husband and I both knew long before becoming parents, was that we would opt for cloth diapers over disposables. We just would not feel like we were being true to our environmental selves if we were to contribute to the mounds of disposable diapers piling up in landfills. But then I discovered an alternative that was even more natural and environmentally-friendly than cloth diapering!
While traveling in India, we saw mothers wearing diaperless babies, sometimes on overnight train rides. Yet the mothers clothing never seemed to get soiled. How was that possible?
When we returned home to the US, I researched the concept and found out that here it is referred to as Elimination Communication (EC) or Natural Infant Hygiene. Instead of relying completely on diapers, the parents hold the baby over a potty, or other acceptable receptacle, to pee and poo. It is not conventional potty-training. Rather, it is offering the baby an alternative location to eliminate than in a diaper.
This approach makes sense to me. I could not stand leaving my newborn in a poopy diaper, even if I knew he would probably go again in five minutes. Well-meaning friends advised that I wait ten minutes before changing the diaper, to make sure he was done pooing, but that went against my instincts.
As a compromise between old ways and new norms, many of us who practice EC use diapers as back-up. So we do not have to worry when we miss a signal, we just promptly change the wet diaper.
Communicating with my baby about his elimination needs, through acknowledging his signals and making cueing sounds, has been a challenging but rewarding experience. I am much happier watching my cute little baby proudly perched on his toilet seat reducer taking care of business, than I would be rinsing poo off of cloth diapers or throwing yet another disposable in the trash.
No Pureed Baby Food Here, Just Eating Along with the Rest of Us
Before becoming a mother, and even before reading a library of parenting books, I had given one of my friends advice regarding baby food. Instead of purchasing baby food at the store, simply make your own with a blender and organic fruits and vegetables. I thought that was the natural way to go. (And I still do prefer it over purchasing name brand baby food in individually wrapped servings.)
While reading "The Womanly Art of Breastfeeding," I learned that pureed baby foods were invented at a time when baby formula was so poor nutritionally that babies were started on solids at six-weeks-old, long before their bodies were ready for solids. If you wait until a baby is developmentally ready for solids, "baby food" is not needed at all.
Once I learned of this concept of Baby-Led-Weaning I was all for it. Why should babies be treated so differently from the rest of us? "Here, you have some goop, while we eat real food."
My baby is approaching six-months-old, the age around when the gut is developed enough to handle solid foods. Rather than starting solids the day he turns six months old, I am looking for the signs that he is ready to try solids. He can sit up on his own, so the first indication is checked off the list. Now I am on the look-out for him to develop the pincer grasp- picking up small objects with his thumb and forefinger. The true test will be the day he reaches for a piece of food from my plate, puts it in his mouth (not all over his head), swallows instead of thrusting it out of his mouth, and reaches for some more. From that point we can give him hand-held chunks of whatever we are eating (minus foods with choking or allergy hazards). This method is easier on me, since I will not be spending hours in the kitchen preparing baby food, and it will be a fun way for Baby to explore and learn about food.
After all, food before one is just for fun! It is more about learning about tastes and textures than it is about getting nutritional value from the food.
What do you think of the natural parenting methods of babywearing, elimination communication, and baby led weaning? Do they sound foreign to you? Or enticing enough to try?
You can find Heidi Avelino writing about natural parenting and other tips for living a cleaner greener lifestyle at: http://naturalbeautylifestyle.
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Naturally yours,
Heidi Avelino
Heidi Avelino
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