6/12/2019 EC Guide for Caregivers - Google Docs
Elimination Communication
Guide for Caregivers
Instructions for Parents on How to Use the
“EC Guide for Caregivers”
Parents:
Print out the following pages.
Fill out all the blanks in this form, check
all the appropriate boxes, and give to
your caregiver.
Be sure to demonstrate pottying for
him/her and supply the necessary
pottying gear.
For support along the way, visit our
Book Owners’ Website at
[Link]/upgrade.
Happy pottying!
~Andrea
[Link] © Andrea Olson
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Elimination Communication
Guide for Caregivers
Dear _______________________________,
As we’ve discussed, our family potties our baby instead of relying on the diaper as a
full-time toilet. This is called Elimination Communication, or EC for short. We’d like to share
some information about EC with you and teach you how to potty our baby. We encourage you to
begin incorporating EC as much as you can into the caring you provide for our baby while we
are away.
But first, we want to reduce ALL pressure off of you from doing EC perfectly. You can’t!
So, let that go right now. Read this guide and do your best to integrate pottying into your daily
care of our baby just like you would integrate feeding and napping - part of the whole picture!
Once you make a “catch,” you’ll begin to build confidence (and we hope you’ll love EC as much
as we do).
This Guide will teach you:
● What is EC?
● How to Know When Our Baby Needs to Go
● How to Potty Our Baby
● If Things Change or Stop Working
● Demonstration & Gear
⬥ ⬥ ⬥
What is EC?
EC is a non-coercive, gentle way to potty an infant from birth, following a baby’s natural
awareness of its elimination and its desire to keep itself, its caregivers, and its bed dry. It is
practiced by over half the world’s population and has been adapted to fit a modern lifestyle.
Keys to EC
When you are doing EC with our child, please remember:
1. EC is gentle. Hold our baby gently, speak gently, and handle the whole process with care.
2. EC is non-coercive. It doesn’t involve praise, rewards, punishment, force, anger, or
consequences.
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Elimination Communication
Guide for Caregivers
3. EC is about communication, connection, responsive caregiving, and making future potty
independence smoother and less confusing. It is not about goals, pressure, timelines, “potty
training,” or completion.
4. EC is not about hovering or obsessing. It is about “keeping an ear out” to help maintain an
awareness around & assist with elimination (as we do when noticing the baby needs to eat or
sleep) while doing everyday grownup things with baby carried along.
5. EC is fun. Laugh often. Marvel in the awesomeness of what you’re witnessing (both the easy
and the challenging times!).
6. If you find yourself becoming frustrated or stressed while doing EC, take a breath, regain your
center, let a few misses happen, refrain from punishing or complaining to the baby, and talk to
us openly about it when we next arrive (or even call us right away if you need to!). We know it
can sometimes be challenging. We are here to help support YOU because you are so lovingly
supporting our baby! Anyone who does EC needs support, and we are yours.
Where to learn more
If you are so inclined to learn more about EC, you can learn more at [Link] through
their blog articles, podcasts, and videos.
⬥ ⬥ ⬥
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Guide for Caregivers
How to Know When Our Baby Needs to Go
Again, we want to reduce ALL pressure off of you from doing EC perfectly. You can’t! So, let that
go right now.
That said, you can ease in to offering with something called the 4 Easy Catches. Here’s more on
those, followed by a few more ways to know baby needs to go and what to do to potty our baby.
Go into the 4 Easy Catches with ZERO expectations and see what happens. When you first
make a “catch,” it will build your confidence.
The 4 Easy Catches
The 4 Easy Catches are a great way to ease in to EC. You can also ONLY use the 4 Easy
Catches during your time watching our baby and have a great deal of success. They are:
1. Wake-ups - offer when our baby wakes up. You have to go to the bathroom when you
wake up, and babies do, too. It doesn’t matter if our baby goes or not, we just want baby
to experience consistency on this one.
2. Poops - when you notice our baby starting to bear down, grimace, hide, toot, and you
think a poop is imminent, we ask that you offer the potty instead of waiting for baby to
poop in the diaper (only to clean it up after). Gently say “wait” and have baby finish on
the potty.
3. Diaper changes - offer when you change the diaper even if it’s already wet because
there may be more pee, or a surprise poo.
4. Ins and Outs - to keep baby more comfortable for longer periods of time, offer the potty
at transitions such as before and after using the highchair or carseat, before and after a
bath, and before and after using a baby carrier. Just the offering is important, as it gives
an opportunity for our baby to be more comfortable and less fussy (which will make both
your lives easier!).
So those are the 4 Easy Catches.
Now let’s look at the 4 things that could mean a baby needs to go to the bathroom….
The 4 Roads to Potty Time
See the enclosed sheet titled “The 4 Roads to Potty Time” for a comprehensive list of common
signals, times, and intuitions that may tell you it’s potty time.
The next section shares our more personal habits around offering pottytunities.
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When We Offer Pottytunities
We offer “pottytunities” (opportunities to go potty) based on:
(parent, check all that apply)
⃞ our Baby’s Signals (as we’ve learned them)
⃞ our Baby’s Natural Timing (as we’ve learned it)
⃞ some more Generic Times to potty, and
⃞ our Intuition.
Our Baby’s Current Signals
When you see our baby do this/one of these things, offer a pottytunity:
____________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________
Our Baby’s Natural Timing
After feeding or waking, our baby typically has to go at this frequency so you can offer a
pottytunity at these times:
____________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________
Generic Times Babies Commonly Go
Other than the 4 Easy Catches in the last section, try to offer our baby the potty at these
common times that most babies need to go:
____________________________________________________________________________
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____________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________
Our/Your Intuition
Sometimes you may have a thought about our baby needing to potty...if this happens, act on it!
You may grow to have intuitions around pottying needs over time, which can look like:
____________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________
⬥ ⬥ ⬥
How to Potty Our Baby
When you think it may be potty time (one of those 4 things above has happened, or it’s one of
the 4 Easy Catches named previously), here’s how to offer our baby a pottytunity:
1. Acknowledge, undress, and go to potty space
We prefer to (circle one) verbally / nonverbally acknowledge it’s potty time by saying/doing this:
____________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________
We prefer to potty our baby here (environment): _____________________________________
...on/over this (receptacle): ______________________________________________________
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2. Position & Cue
When you hold our baby in position, please be sure the baby is comfortable, warm, and feels
safe and secure.
We prefer to potty our baby in this position: (circle one)
Or...we use this position: ________________________________________________________
When our baby is in position, we Cue to let baby know it’s okay to go. A Cue is a noise or word
(or sign language) we make that baby associates with releasing a pee/poo.
Our cue for pee is: _____________________________________________________________
Our cue for poo is: _____________________________________________________________
When our baby pees & poos at the same time, we cue like this:
____________________________________________________________________________
3. If Our Baby Doesn’t Do Anything While In Position & Cueing...
We’d like you to help our baby relax by: (circle one)
Singing / Running water / Turning our back to give privacy / Giving this toy: ________________
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Other: _______________________________________________________________________
If our baby protests your efforts to potty her (struggles, cries, etc.), change the scenery as
our baby may still need to go. Walk around for a few minutes with baby bottomless, then try
something different:
Try changing position to our 2nd preference:
____________________________________________________________________________
...and/or try our 2nd preference of Environment:
____________________________________________________________________________
...and/or try our 2nd preference of Receptacle:
____________________________________________________________________________
Never force our baby to stay in any position and do not encourage our baby to potty
against its will. After a 2nd unsuccessful try, go ahead and wait until the next time you think our
baby may need to go.
Note: a “misguess” or “miss” is GOOD information...it does not mean you are not good at EC.
Just take it as an opportunity to learn and we can brainstorm fixes when we get home.
4. How Our Baby Says “I’m finished” & “I don’t need to potty now.”
When our baby does this:
____________________________________________________________________________
it means “I’m finished.”
When our baby does this:
____________________________________________________________________________
it means “I don’t need to potty right now.”
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5. When You “Catch” a Pee or Poo
(parent, check all that apply)
⃞ We like to reflect what we saw by saying: ____________________________________
______________________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________________
when we catch our baby’s pee/poo.
⃞ We (circle one) do / don’t want you to praise our baby (ex: “Good job.”).
⃞ We don’t want you to say anything when you make a catch. Just do it matter-of-factly.
[Link] You Have a “Miss” or “Mis-guess”
For a “miss” (baby went in diaper, on floor, in clothes), we like to say:
____________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________
For a “mis-guess” (caregiver guessed incorrectly and baby didn’t have to go), we like to say:
____________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________
Remember: All misses and misguesses are GREAT information that can help you modify what
you’re doing for next time! No sweat.
7. Cleaning Up
We prefer this method of cleaning up after our baby potties: (ex: type of wipes to use, rinse or
not, toilet paper, cleaning potty, etc.)
____________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________
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____________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________
Great! So that was a quick run-down of how to potty our baby. If you’re curious, you can watch
some videos on EC here.
⬥ ⬥ ⬥
If Things Change or Stop Working
...please let us know!
Sometimes pottying habits change. These changes can help us know if our baby is going
through:
● illness/imbalance
● a growth spurt
● teething
● approach of a developmental milestone (crawling, walking, talking, etc.)
● an allergy or diet issue
● conscious experimentation with the pottying act.
...and might result in a Potty Pause. If it’s a Potty Pause, we can wait it out and it will likely pass.
But if it’s something else, we need to know so we’ll be able to react as a team. Sometimes
something “bigger” is up and EC gives valuable information that we’d like you to share with us if
you notice a shift in the practice.
Again, if things change or stop working, it isn’t your fault...it’s a sign that we need to change up
what we’re doing. No worries!
⬥ ⬥ ⬥
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Demonstration & Gear
Please remind us to demonstrate how we potty our baby for you in-person, and let’s talk about
what gear we might need to provide you with to make pottying our baby more convenient
(potties, cloth wipes, etc.).
In closing...
We are very excited that you’ve expressed a willingness to learn how to EC our baby in our
absence...thank you for joining us on this wonderful journey!
Sincerely,
_________________________________
_________________________________
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the 4 for
roads to potty
elimination communication
time
1 Signals
different ways babies tell us they need to pee or poo
2 Natural Timing
patterns unique to your baby, based on
• amount of time after feeding
• sudden or increased fussiness
• amount of time after waking
• cry or scream
• shift from stillness to movement • and the spacing thereafter
3
• shift from movement to stillness
• squirming or wriggling (especially in bed if co-sleeping) Transition Times
• for older ages during sleep, crying out, crawling in bed, talking, or
common times babies generally need to go
flipping head from side to side
• upon waking from sleep
• grimace or other concentrated poo face (may look like a smile)
• during a diaper change
• popping off the breast while feeding; difficulty latching
• grunting or bearing down (may also be done squatting/standing) • before or after a bath
• staring off into the distance • after a miss, as baby’s bladder may not have fully emptied
• trembling, shaking, hiccuping, yawning, rubbing face or nose, • after taking baby out of anything she’s been in for a while
shivering, “talking” or “talking” more loudly (carseat, stroller, baby carrier, jumper, seat, arms, or high chair)
• heavier breathing • before putting baby into anything she’ll be in for a while
• “peenie-weenie” - a partial erection that means baby boy needs to go (carseat, stroller, baby carrier, jumper, seat, arms, or high chair)
• grabbing at genitals, especially if squatting or looking at you or the
other pottytunities
bathroom
• offer potty before leaving anywhere
• blowing raspberries (trying to imitate your Cue)
• offer potty upon arriving anywhere
• passing gas (may indicate pee, poo, or both)
4
• looking at...pointing at...or crawling to ==> you, the potty, or the
bathroom Intuition
• arching back in or trying to stand in arms (or in carrier...see below) • you have a funny feeling that baby may need to go
• “phantom pee” (feels warm but baby hasn’t peed)
• the word “pee” or “poo” crosses your mind
• trying to “escape” the high chair, car seat, your lap, or the baby carrier
(by standing, arching, etc.) • you suddenly imagine baby needing to pee
• trying to remove diaper or grabbing at diaper or underwear • you suddenly have to pee yourself
• sudden agitation or hyperactivity • you smell pee or poo before it comes out
babywearing signals (in-arms or in a carrier) • you have a vivid thought or insistence inside that you are “sure”
• sudden crying or fussiness • bouncing baby needs to go, or that baby can’t possibly need to go again
• wriggling • arching out of the carrier • you experience another sudden random potty thought
• feet pushing against you • "phantom pee” on either side (feels • you swear you just got peed on (feels warm but baby hasn’t
• trying to stand up in the carrier warm but baby hasn’t peed) peed - “phantom pee”)
[Link] © Andrea Olson
