Like everyone else, I've had my shares of troubles with the dreaded spica casts. Kennedy only had her first cast for 5 weeks and it was a dirty smelly one. I was embarrassed and sad to see how she was covered in horrible diaper rashes. I attribute my first cast failure to several mistakes - not regularly changing her diaper at night, not wiping out the inside diaper opening during diaper changes and not tucking the back of the inside diaper into the cast (it was a very tight opening - I should have used the spatula trick). After the cast change I became diligent in all these areas (hubby says I'm obsessed) and Kennedy is still smell-free after 10 wks in this cast.
My second mistake was lining the cast opening with pantyliners. Many women petal the opening with pads or moleskin and have great results. However, I was not one of them. I'm sure my technique was wrong but I would never mess with that again. In my experience, repeatedly taking the pads off caused the tape to tear away from the lining and the cotton inside the cast became soaked in urine and Kennedy just reaked. I was devestated that the cast stunk and all my efforts had been in vain. However, with a lot of time and effort it was fixable. I simply took all the tape off and used a blow dryer on the cool setting to dry out the inner lining (between the gortex and the fiberglass). Once the lining was mostly dry I blotted it with a little white vinegar on my fingers to neutralize the smell and then blew it completely dry. I did this while laying Kennedy over my legs for optimal working room (it was just in the back) and had many toys in front of her to occupy her while I worked. Luckily, Kennedy actually fell asleep since it took me about two hours to dry her completely and tape her back up. I am happy to report that although it was a terrible experience, we survived and you would never have known it had happened. Drying her out while blotting vinegar worked and she didn't smell after that!
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