The silent killer

Many first time parents/ppl without kids don't realise that the smell of soiled nappies vary according to age. I for one had always thought all nappies would smell like adult poo which absolutely grossed me out so much so that I could not imagine myself being a parent. Ahem.. and look at me now!

Anyway, when your baby is fresh born out into the world, they will most likely do a big poo on their 1st/2nd day of life. This nappy change is completely horrifying. It is black in colour & runny as anything (because after all, the baby has been living on amniotic fluid for the past 9 months... what do you expect?!).

Then for the first 1-3months, their poo smells like popcorn or I would describe it as a 'nutrigrain' like smell because all they consume is milk. If it's breastmilk, their poo doesn't smell as bad. But if it's formula milk, the poo is a bit more pungent but still, it is not that bad, truly! The texture of the poo is usually very runny. Thus when your bub has done a poo, you will know because 1) you will smell it 2) You will definitely hear it because it makes a big runny Brrr Brrr Brrr noise.

However, as soon as you put the baby on solids any time btw 4-6months, the sound & smell of poo completely changes. All of a sudden, I have absolutely no idea whether or not my baby has done a poo. For example, usually after a feed, I will get Z to sit up & do an 'oooohh' expression. Ten minutes later, you can see him push & all of a sudden, the sound of brrr brrr brrr has never felt so good. It's a relief to every parent's ears because you know your báby isn't constipated..phew! But as soon as they are on solids, all of a sudden when they poo, it doesn't make one single noise because the texture of their poo is like mud/clay (and not noisy watery runny type).

It took me about two goes to finally learn how to determine whether Z had finished pooing or not. This is how you tell:
1) If it smells bad and this time, I mean really SMELLS bad... very close to the adult poo smell but not quite there yet b/c Z hasn't started eating meat!
2) If his pushing facing expression stops
3) If he doesn't want to sit but rather wants to play after pushing for a while

And after this has happened, I would be dreading to open up his soiled nappy. And when I do, it's a horrifying clay-like poo. Gosh, it's still giving me nightmares!

So there you have it, nappy change in our household has never been so terrifying! Ahhh... the joy of parenting!