Does your infant get a reoccurring diaper rash that literally tears your little ones booty up? I'm talking, raw, bleeding, and no matter what you do you can't get it to go away? A rash so bad that every time you change your little ones diaper your heart shatters and you want to cry? Yeah, I've dealt with that too. It's literally the worst thing in the entire world. I'm no doctor and I sure am not qualified to diagnose your child's diaper rash so I recommend that any rash that bad you get it looked at so that you can get the proper creams to clear it up as quickly and effectively as possible, but let me just tell you, that's no ordinary diaper rash. In the experience that I have had with it, after countless doctors appointments, I feel pretty confident to tell you that it is most likely yeast. If you didn't already know, your little one can get yeast rash's when you cloth diaper them. Yeast commonly grows in warm dark places and that of course tends to be a diaper. More specifically, a cloth diaper. If your little one has sensitive skin like my child does, a yeast rash can turn into the war with the yeast monster. Let me right now, if your child has a yeast rash that keeps coming back no matter what you do, you're dealing with yeast spores, not just yeast. Did you know there was a difference? I sure didn't. After literally months of dealing with horrible rash over horrible rash I was at my wits end. I was about two seconds away from throwing my cloth in the garbage (okay not really) and going back to disposables. I couldn't bear to see my little baby boy with such horrible rashes on his bottom! It just wasn't fair. That night after I had a mommy meltdown I stayed up and did over three hours of research, reading website after website, blog after blog, trying to figure out how to stop this evil yeast monster and how to be able to keep my little man in cloth. All signs pointed to Tea Tree Oil and Grapefruit Seed Extract.
Tea tree oil is a natural antifungal and antibacterial treatment that is cloth diaper safe. This will kill any yeast that is on your diaper. I use tea tree oil ever other wash now with cloth diapers. It may be a little over kill but I figured it's safe on my diapers, so why not be preventative. If after using tea tree oil your child still gets the rashes then you're dealing with spores. Grapefruit Seed Extract is the only natural way to kill yeast SPORES. If you do not kill the spores your yeast will keep coming back.
After realizing that I needed to do some serious stripping, I spent seven, yes seven hours washing and stripping my diapers. It was absolutely ridiculous, but it worked. Baby A hasn't had a yeast rash in months thanks to my dedication to getting the yeast monster out of our lives for good. Here's how you can properly strip your diapers and be done with the stress and heartbreak of awful yeast rashes.
First and foremost, turn your hot water heater onto it's highest setting possible. You will need scalding hot water to properly clean and rinse your diapers.
Bye Bye Yeast:
1. Rinse your diapers to get the stinkies washed out a little
1. Rinse your diapers to get the stinkies washed out a little
2. Do a regular wash with no soap
3. Rinse the diapers three times
4. Add eight to ten drops of Tea Tree Oil and wash your diapers on regular
5. Rinse diapers
6. Rinse them again
Optional Step (if you have yeast spores in the diaper, this is a must): Add five drops of Grapefruit Seed Extract
Optional Step: Rinse diapers
7.Wash diapers with Cloth Diaper detergent
8. Rinse Diapers
9. Switch to dryer on HIGH or sun dry
If you still have a severe amount of yeast in the diapers you may need to repeat this procedure two-three times before putting your child back in them. It only took me one time to strip the yeast out of my sons diapers, but it may be wise to repeat this procedure a second time to be absolutely certain Make sure that you do this to all of your diapers otherwise it will defeat the purpose.
Yeast Prevention:
Every other wash I treat the diapers by rinsing them, adding tea tree oil, rinse, wash with Cloth Diaper Detergent, rinse, and dry on hot. At least twice a month I substitution the tea tree oil for the grapefruit seed extract to triple check that there won't be any yeast spores.
It's a lot of work, but the outcome is well worth it. You can beat this yeast monster, I promise! If you have any questions or need encouragement feel free to send me an email and we will get you through it!
*MCO is a contributing writer as part of the Thrifty Nifty Mommy Blogger Network. You can read more from MCO on her personal blog, Mommy's Craft Obsession!*
In my experience dealing with yeast diaper rash the only way to kill it in your diapers is to use chlorine bleach. A couple drops of tea tree oil diluted in the wash is not even close enough to kill yeast. I have tried both tea tree and grapefruit seed extract and it did not work for me. It does work really great in a wipe solution though because you can get the concentration you need. Both of my boys have gotten yeast diaper rashes with every new tooth that comes in so I have dealt with this many times. An antifungal cream such as canesten with disposables and a bleach wash is how I got rid of it each time.
ReplyDeleteI'm sorry to hear that bleach is the only way you were able to rid your diapers of yeast! I have been doing everything that I said above for a couple of months now and I have only had the yeast come back once when I got lazy with my washing and did not use my preventative steps! We use the antifungal cream Nystatin when my son gets the the first sign of a rash, unfortunately we have stained some diapers because of it, but I am unable to use disposables on him due to the sensitivity of his skin, when I tried disposables his booty was the shade of a strawberry!
DeleteI think the most important thing is to find out what works for your child and roll with it. The tea tree oil may work for some, where as bleach may work best for others. As long as we are taking the actions to rid our little ones of the horrible rashes than we are doing the best we can!
we havent had any yeast probblems yet and hopefully wont be any time soon- knock on fluff diapers.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the Step by step of how you made the yeast fo away. 6 months away from Baby #1, yeast is a nightmare to me. Good idea from Caedman to use tea tea & grapefruit extract in wipes, and to be prepared to use bleach if all else fails.
ReplyDeleteSo glad I happened across this. We had to stop cloth diapering my daughter because of the horrible yeast diaper rashes they gave her. Every time we went back to cloth, it would return. Now we are expecting our 2nd and I've been so excited to break out the cloth diapers again but in the back of my mind have been concerned that we'll have the same issue. Now I know what to do! Thanks so much!
ReplyDelete