Crazy Tantrums during Nappy Changes!!

Hi all,

DS is 18 months old and the past couple of weeks he's started throwing tantrums for nappy changes (not all.. but most). It takes the two of us to change his nappy because he thrashes about, cries, tries to roll over and kicks. I really don't like restraining him but it's all we can do not to have poop all over the place. :doh:

We try to distract him with toys, songs, food etc .. when we're done he is either happy again, or keeps on crying cos he's worked himself up into such a state.

We are thinking of trying pull-up nappies but I really don't want to because they're just so darn expensive. He's too young to be TT and definitely not showing any signs yet.

It's driving us nuts. Is this a normal behaviour? :dunno: Tell me they grow out of it!!

Thanks!

xoxox

Yup it's normal unfortunately!!

Yeah its normal and yes they do grow out of it.

I went through a stage where I would have to put my legs over DD's legs to keep her still while I changed her nappy. That was doing my head in so I went and brought her a special cup and she got to have it every time we changed her nappy (with just water or milk in it). She would be concentrating on that for 20 seconds which was ample time to get a new nappy on. Apart from that I was pretty strern with her. WOuld say "No DD, you need to stay still while mummy changes your nappy" etc.

Thank god the phase doesnt last long.

Oh my gosh yes my DS (same - 18mths) is exactly the same!!!! I hate it - we sometimes have to hold him down to get the nappies on and its awful!

We're in cloth but I'm contemplating switching to pull-ups as well, just for the ease of whip 'em off, whip a new one on.

MIL says he's fine (she looked after him a bit before Christmas) as long as she gives him something to distract him but that doesn't seem to work for us!

I hear ya! I remember my DD went through the same thing but she was easier to be stern with - "Lie still for nappy change!" - whereas DS doesn't seem to care! With DD we ended up using pull-ups for a bit til she got over it, then went back to cloth.

Good luck!

DS can crack the sads during changes too ...

And pull ups wouldn't help for us, because the time consuming bit is cleaning his bum up and wiping and drying all his creases, which is no easier with him standing ...

Our sure fire way of getting him to hold still is to give him a small bottle of milk during changes, but obvioulsy this is not ideal, as he's getting too big for bottles and we want him to be 100% on cups soon ...

Other things which we find have varying success are to give him his hairbrush or toothbrush to use during changes, or to get a sticker (even just one of those ones that is on apples and oranges, etc) and sticking it on his hand ... it takes him a little while to pull it off, and once he does, we grab it and stick it on his other hand, or arm, etc - somewhere he can grab it ... not the most sophisticated toy, but it keeps him occupied and tantrum-free as often as not :)

i agree that it's normal. i put it in the category of asserting independence (well, that's how it seemed here!)...it's no fun having your nappy changed when you were in the middle of a game/playing etc. and it's just another thing that someone else decides the timing of (itms?). i agree with distraction techniques. do you think he'd understand if you explained that he could do something/return to his game after it was done? i often let DS get his nappy, open/close the wipes container etc so he was part of the whole process.

but in the end, i found around 18 months a challenging time for behaviour in general because DS' language wasn't great yet so he was (i guess) frustrated that he couldn't communicate in words. now, a year on, he'll tell me he doesn't need a clean nappy but we can talk about it more & i can offer two places (for eg) that he can be changed & he gets to choose.

i had a friend who changed to pull ups around that time because her DD would refuse to lie down for nappy changes. that seemed to solve their issues (although when I babysat, she would lie down for me - cheeky monkey!)

good luck - i hope this stage passes quickly!

oh yeah, plenty of kicking and thrashing at nappy time here too. and now DD has worked out how to take her nappy off so sometimes there are extra nappy changes in the day.