How do swim diapers work?

Hahaha I am also very confused about swim diapers! From my understanding both the disposable and reusable are only intended to hold SOLIDS poops. They aren’t intended to hold pee or runny poops.

I’ve been putting him in a disposable with a reusable on top and just making sure everything fits really tight. I bring a handful of disposable ones.

This week his poops actually transitioned from the runny baby poops to more solid pancakes so I’m feeling less anxious about a poop sneaking out in the pool. I also feel like he might be less likely to poop while swimming in general.

We layer a reusable swim diaper over a disposable. They do not trap liquids at all but are supposed to contain poop.

They don’t hold liquids. Imagine a normal nappy in the pool, it would swell up immediately. Swim nappies ONLY hold in solids, and some more dense liquids. Ie if there is pee, you might see some yellow in the nappy, but most of it will be in the pool.

It’s basically to stop the poop floating in the pool.

Different pools will have different rules. Some will want a swim and regular diaper (whether both are reusable or not, the concern is more having two diapers), while others are fine with just the one.

Swim diapers, whether disposable of not, don’t retain fluid. They don’t bulk up like a regular diaper does, so pee flows freely. The purpose of a swim diaper is to catch poop; that’s it.

For mine, I did a disposable swim diaper over top of a disposable regular diaper until she was about 7 months. Her entire bottom half was puffy and it was funny to see, but I just wanted some extra protection because I didn’t trust her being so young.

Once I got a little more confidence in her, and had a sense of her pooping routine, I switched to both a reusable swim diaper and a disposable swim diaper. That was from about 7-11 months. Now, at 14 months, we do just the reusable swim diaper.

If you just use reusable swim diapers, definitely bring spares in the event they poop. You will not need to swap the diapers when you’re getting in and out of the pool unless it’s going to be for a really long period and you just don’t want them sitting in a damp diaper for that long, which would be true even if they weren’t swimming.

Check the rules at your pool, but I would recommend a disposable swim diaper overtop of a reusable swim diaper, at least the first few times, but generally just a reusable swim diaper should be enough. If I were to do it again, I’d skip the disposable non-swim diaper stage that I did; it wasn’t necessary with swim diapers as options.

ETA: one of the benefits of the disposable swim diapers is that if your child is growing fast, it’s more cost effective then having them outgrow reusable swim diapers at the same rate. I got all my reusable swim diapers passed down to me from a friend, so that wasn’t as much of a concern for me.

We layer a reusable pocket nappy that lost is waterproofing and a happy nappy over the top. We just rinse out and wash when back off holiday.

We go for a double layer just in case of poo. Don't use a regular nappy as it will just swell up in the water.

If you dress baby for swimming before arrival h then put a normal nappy over the top so you don't get wee'd on

At pool side of just there for a bit we just use the swim wear. If all day if get them changed to avoid getting cold

As others said, swim diapers let liquid through. It's why we don't get kiddo in the swim stuff until we are at the pool, or else car seat /pushchair risks getting wet.

We used a disposable swim diapers, or a regular one, under a reusable neoprene swim diapers (rather than a reusable cloth diaper shell)

The neoprene ones are like scuba suit material so it helps to keep even runny poops contained. That was the rule for our old pool, to double diaper.

Tip: get baby dressed at home. Then put a regular diaper over the swim diaper to get you from point A to point B before swimming. If you’re in and out a lot while swimming, in my mind you’re already wet so not going to notice pee leaking. Then before you go home dry baby and put into normal diaper and clothes.

We've always just used a reusable swim diaper since kiddo started swimming at 9 months. He has pooped in it exactly once. We didn't find out until we went to take off the swim diaper in the shower and it was a royal mess - the diaper really did its job and kept everything in.