* “You need to strip or boil your diapers every month.” If your diapers develop odors every month, I would respectfully submit the possibility that something is not right with your wash routine. Clean diapers do not smell bad. Clean diapers freshly peed on will not put everyone around the baby into a coma. If the diapers smell bad either fresh out of the washer, fresh out of the dryer, or when freshly peed on, they are not fully clean. Detergent residue or insufficient cleaning are the usual culprits. You may need more detergent, you probably need less detergent, or you might need a different detergent. In many cases the solution is to simply rinse twice.

* “You need bleach to kill germs.” For this one, I first need to ask if cloth diapers are really so full of germs that need killing. I have only seen one study that actually looked at whether cloth diapers have germs on them after proper washing and drying and they looked ONLY at Gerber plastic pants that can’t be washed and dried. I would hazard a guess that cloth diapers are actually pretty clean since I have not actually ever heard of a baby getting sick from something proven to come off a clean, dry cloth diaper. For one thing, most germs do not live very long without a host. If your diapers are clean, dry and odor-free, most germs are simply going to die of loneliness. Also, if you are using synthetic diapers, germs don’t live well on those. Again, not an area where much science has been put forth. The one study I found on laundry and germs was sponsored by Clorox. No potential for conflict of interest there!

As a rule, germs are not fond of changes in pH (such as from adding detergent, vinegar, etc, to a wash). They don’t like agitation. They also really don’t like ultraviolet light (also a natural bleach alternative!). Sunlight is awesome for making your diapers smell and look cleaner. And they don’t like heat, so you can boil your clean prefolds if you want to get rid of yeast or something. Many people swear by using a few drops of tea tree oil or grapefruit seed extract in the wash (would love to see a study on this!). 

While the idea that we want sterile diapers to put on our babies is appealing, it is not very realistic. Disposables are not sterile. Your baby’s clothes are not sterile. Heaven only knows what your kid is eating off the floor right now. (If you are looking shocked, it is likely because your baby is not yet crawling.)

Bleach residue leads to some really bad rashes. It also pollutes our environment and waterways with nasty byproducts. More directly, it will wear out your diapers prematurely and break down elastic and PUL.

That said, if your doctor insists you need to bleach your diapers to get rid of a staph infection or something, you do what you gotta do. Just be aware that using bleach will void the warranty for most diaper manufacturers (BumGenius and Mother Ease have their own rules about bleach and they do allow it sparingly.) If you MUST bleach your diapers, keep it to once a month and 1/4 cup of bleach.

But, wait! There’s more tomorrow!

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