Study: Lack of diapers linked to depression

[Bette Noir]

78. Dear God. This thread gave me flashbacks to my daughter's infancy.

I had cloth diapers. I didn't have a washer and dryer. Every day, from the time my daughter was two weeks old, I'd put a sack of soiled diapers over one shoulder, with the baby and a diaper bag in the other arm, and schlep my Caesarian incision five blocks up and down hills (we lived in San Francisco) to the laundromat. There, I'd wash and dry the diapers while the baby screamed (she didn't want to spend her days in the laundromat, strapped into a chair). When they were done, I'd walk home again, and up three flights of spiral stairs to the room I rented in a friend's apartment.

It was hell; I spent my whole life washing diapers. It was almost a blessing when I fell on those spiral stairs, and sprained my ankle badly enough that I was housebound for a month. Since it was a big city, I could get diapers delivered from the grocery store, and I never looked back.

Whenever I hear some self-righteous git complain about the solid-waste-disposal problem caused by disposable diapers (usually men, always childless), I challenge them to wash diapers for a single mother. Not one has ever taken me up on the challenge.