The Wailing Wipies!!!

I have noticed something different about baby wipes in this day and age. It's an odd subject, I know, but really I have.

Once upon a time, when Bregon was a baby, I seem to remember cheerful diaper changes with much laughing and giggling and silliness (not enough to cause an accident of course!) I don't recall any unhappiness or outbursts of the "Owie's" or anything dreary of that sort.

Fast forward to this day and age, and it seems that every time I go to change one of my babies' diapers, there is a sudden downpour of tears and wriggling and "Ouch" noises echoing throughout my house! I just couldn't figure out why this was happening until the other day.

It would seem that I have become one of those trusting consumers that has quite taken for granted that a product designed for something as sensitive as a baby's bottom would actually be soft and gentle. I have been conditioned since I was a child to think that products that include the word "Baby" in its name must take a "No more tears" approach to its very design and composition.

Boy was I wrong! Have any of you actually TRIED a baby wipe? I don't mean take them into the privy with you and replace your Charmin with it or anything, but seriously. Have you ever tried a baby wipe for something other than wiping your hands after a particularly icky and messy diaper?

I know I have used baby wipes to not only clean my trio's tiny hiney's, but I have also used them to clean their faces after dinner (think back to when your baby was just starting solids) and to give them a quick wipe-down after a dusty and hot day in the park prior to loading them into their car seats for the trip home.

The other night, I needed to take my make-up off and found that my husband had already jumped into the shower before I could race him for use of the faucet, so I just grabbed what came natural, a nice, handy dandy baby wipe. We used to use them to remove our stage make-up after a production back before the babies were born. I thought it would be okay.

Well, it DID remove my make-up. It even removed a bit more... Yep, it rubbed little places in my skin on my face. Then to make matters worse, it actually BURNED!!! And I am one of those few people who uses rubbing alcohol and cotton balls to clean my face in the mornings too so I am used to that tingly feeling.

Normally that tingly feeling wouldn't bother me. This time it did, though. This was something that is supposed to be used to clean my baby. If this baby wipe could do this to my 30 something aged skin, what was it really doing to my babies' little behinds?

Is this why my babies have diaper rash so badly sometimes? Could this be why we have more tears than the giggles that I had been used to when my eldest was little? I had thought that maybe my diaper cream wasn't doing it's job. I should have realized that something was different when I would go to wipe their little tushes and there would be tiny spots of blood from little sores that formed on their tiny hiney's.

I don't know what I thought. I suppose I thought it was irritation from them drinking to much juice or my forgetting to remember to cut their juice with enough water to make it not as acidic. I never realized that the wipes that I was using might be the root of the problem.

These wipes are advertised as "Natural," "Soft," "Gentle," and my personal favorite, "Cushiony thick." This is a name brand wipe. This isn't one of the generic ones at all. I don't understand what happened to those wipes of old that didn't seem to cause any problems.

I have several different brands of wipes floating around the house as well. I decided to try them all out and see if the others did anything close to what the ones that burned and scraped did. Most were abrasive in some fashion or another and every one of them burned to some extent.

Be careful when choosing baby products! I am learning the hard way that they just do not make them like they used to! I know that as a Mom, I was accustomed to grabbing a baby wipe to clean little faces when they were grubby from spaghetti and ravioli. I was spoiled into using them as an in-between bath-time solution for not-so-fresh moments.

I will definitely be looking for an alternative for my kids. Sadly, none of my samples that I had floating around the house seemed to be any better than what I had been using. I suppose I could use wash rags, but I seem to remember a similar abrasive problem when having to use them in the hospital with my eldest. Ah well, maybe someone will invent a sort of diaper cream that numbs the bum a bit so we can clean up our babies truly with "No more tears!"