How To Change a Nappy

Step 1:

Ascertain if you actually need to change the nappy, sometimes it’s just wind. You’ll pray that it is just wind. A good sniff in the lower crotchal region of your baby (note, avoid doing in public) will give a solid indication. If it smells like the fetid stench of Beelzebub’s jock strap then you’re a go.

Avoid sticking your finger in. Trust me on this.

Optional Step 2:

Pretend you haven’t smelt anything and hand baby to your partner as you leave the room. You should mutter something about doing the washing up.

N.B. This only works once.

Step 2:

Take baby to the changing area that you have set up. If you haven’t set one up then you’re an idiot. What were you expecting?

Undo the fastening strips and open the front of the nappy. Try to avoid sobbing. Grip your child firmly but gently by the ankles and lift their legs and lower back into the air.

Don’t drop their legs. If you do, you’ll make the room look like you’ve had Jackson Pollock’s scatologically minded cousin over to redecorate.

Step 3:

Slowly slide the nappy out from under your baby. If you move too quickly there is the very real danger of spillage.

Using four or five million wipes, clean the poo up.

N.B. You will get it on you at least once. When you do, a little part of your soul will die. You’ll get over it though.

Step 4:

Locate new nappy. This will initially be somewhere put away out of sight to keep the nursery looking tidy. Within a week all pretence of this will be done with and the new nappies will be out in the open. Until your baby can crawl, then they get put away again.

It’s the circle of housework.

Step 5:

Apply nappy rash cream. When you first use this, you will inadvertently cake on so much it looks like you’re doing some light plastering.

Step 6:

Close new nappy and secure. Somehow redress your child without smearing their clothes with a heady mixture of infant poo and nappy rash cream.

Step 7:

Wash your hands vigorously – possibly in bleach.

Step 8:

Have a fortifying cup of tea, or if after 11 in the morning, gin.

Additional notes:

i) Younger babies poo a lot. Their poo makes it look like they’ve been subsisting on a diet of fermented algae and motor oil.

ii) Older babies tend to have drier, less sloppy poo. Unless they’re ill in which case expect that nappy to be full of hell itself.

iii) When your baby can move, they will choose the most inopportune moment to flip themselves over. This will ensure maximal distribution of fecal matter. Nice.

iv) It’s really not that bad.