Shrip

Abbie is making diaper changes difficult. She’s always made them challenging, but, like world leaders delivering crazy speeches in the UN, she’s taking the experience up to a new level.

Perhaps she feels the need to one-up her brothers. They’ve mastered the old standby of rolling on the changing table, thrashing about like a washing machine agitator with legs, as Ellie likes to say. They wreak havoc on changing routine as I remove the diaper, reposition the baby to keep him from rolling off the table, open the diaper, reposition the baby to keep him from crawling off the table, position the diaper under the baby, flip the baby, reposition the diaper, and attempt to hold the baby in place to attach the diaper while he tries to roll over and I realize that a 10-month-old has surprisingly strong neck muscles.

That technique is so 18 months ago for Abbie. She’s moved on to more maddening maneuvers, such as removing the diaper. She’s been removing her diaper during non-changing times for months, looking down, seeing those tantalizing fastening straps, hearing that satisfying “shrip,” being very disappointed that she’s run out of straps to pull, and then getting yelled at by daddy for some reason, possibly because he missed getting to hear the straps go “shrip.” Fortunately she only does that if she has access to the diaper, and keeping pants on her is usually enough to keep the “shrip” out of mind.

Recently she’s started undoing the straps while I’m changing her. My changing routine is to attach the right strap, attach the left strap, tighten the right strap, and tighten the left strap. Abbie now has the finger dexterity to detach each strap as quickly as I can attach the other one, creating an endless cycle of “shrip” and attach. Sometimes she’ll leave the straps alone just long enough for me to reach to the side to grab her pants, and when I return I find both straps resting at the side, and a toddler with a satisfied smile.

Even when I reach the pantsing stage with the diaper still successfully attached, Abbie has one last surprise. She’s recently started kicking furiously as I try to slip her pants over her feet. The result is I pull one foot through the pants, and watch it slip back out as I try to pull the other through. She’s smiling as she does it, so I don’t think she’s trying to boycott pants or anything radical, she’s just creating a game, just like that unfortunate game she plays where she slaps people in the face and laughs. It started about the time I switched her from shorts to pants, so maybe she discovered that she can disrupt my routine much easier with pants than shorts.

My current solution to her insolence is to ask her to point the parts of her upper body. This diverts her attention to an activity that’s benign, even educational, while more importantly keeping her fingers far away from her diaper. Plus she’s learning all about the body from the chest up, though I’m running out of parts to quiz her on. I may need to break out mommy’s anatomy books to find new parts and keep it fresh.*

The more long-term solution is to make her take charge of things. I need to make her pull on her pants, or better yet potty train her and completely eliminate all diaper changing worries. I’ve been avoiding potty training because it’s a major time investment in the short term, but it’ll save me time in the long run. I’ll need the time by then because the boys will have doubtlessly discovered new ways to make diaper changing challenging.

* “Point to your nasojugal fold. Good!”