Let me give you some backstory before I dive right into this tale. The first thing you should probably know is that we have been trying to potty train Edward in an extremely unsuccessful manner, but the important thing to know is that he has been wearing pull-ups instead of diapers. The only problem is that the pull-ups that we got him are clearly way too small, despite being labeled as “3T,” which is his size. The second thing you should know is that we have been doing a lot of car switching lately. Usually whoever has to drive more on any given day takes the car that gets better gas mileage, and usually that is the same person. But over the past week or two that has fluctuated wildly. Finally, I have to tell you that Ruby’s class is quite fond of Edward, and so whenever he shows up they all run over and give him hugs until I pry them off of him and take him outside. So now, with the stage set, I proudly present to you “Disaster in Diapers, or What Was I Thinking?”
We dropped Ruby off at school on Tuesday without incident. Edward and I hung out at home and worked on using the potty instead of, say, the carpet, but with no luck. When it was time to pick Ruby back up, I put Edward’s pull-up back on him and loaded him into the car. And speaking of loads, by the time we got to school, Edward had filled his pull-up with the most horrible poop explosion that I had seen in probably a year.
I thought that we were done with diapers like that. This was absolutely not normal. It may have been the fact that he had eaten pretty much nothing but blueberries for the previous 24 hours, but for whatever the reason, his pull-up, that was far to small to contain such an event, had been filled and then breached, with his shorts soiled, and a mess reaching all the way up the back of his shirt. It was horrible.
Now, remember when I mentioned that we switched cars a lot? Well, that is suddenly important because, while I had switched the car seats that morning, the diaper bag was still in the other car. I had pretty much nothing to work with except for some Dunkin’ Donuts napkins that were in the glove compartment. And so, because I had no better ideas, I tried to mop up some of him with the napkins, to disastrous effect. I think it just made things worse. I had nowhere near the number of napkins a job like that would require. And so I just shoved a bunch of napkins down the back of his pants in the hope that it would soak up enough of the mess to get us through the next few minutes, and I took him by the hand and walked into the school.
When we arrived at Ruby’s classroom she had not been dismissed yet, so I stood outside the room with a few other parents, waiting for the door to open. At this time Edward decided to stretch his arms above his head as high as possible, and when I looked over at him I was horrified and embarrassed at the sight that was to be seen as his shirt lifted up over his belly. I grabbed him and tried to get him to put his arms down so that the other parents would not see that his backside was stuffed full of Dunkin’ Donut napkins that were oozing feces.
Finally I had to just pick him up and try to contain the horror with my arms, and I stood there, hoping the smell would not give me away, until the door opened. It was then that I made the mistake of putting him down. He immediately ran into the room for hugs, which the children were happy to provide. They were slapping him on the back and trying to lift him up with their bear hugs. Horrified, I dashed over and snatched him up, hoping that none (or few) of the children had poop on their hands now. As I urged Ruby to get ready as quickly as possible, Edward escaped and ran about the room, flapping his arms up and down as hard as possible.
I managed to grab him again and told Ruby to meet me at the car. We ran outside and I strapped him back into his seat, ready to get him home. It was a very smelly ride home. We opened all the windows. And so, in conclusion, shoving a wad of napkins into your child’s diaper is not an effective method for preventing messes, either physical or social. Thank you.