Yeast: Those little red dots that are so hard to get rid of

There's nothing more frustrating than when your little one gets a yeast infection. We battled with it for months before finding a solution that actually worked.

Both boys and girls get yeast and it happens in kids wearing cloth or disposable diapers.

How do you know if your baby has a yeast infection? He or she will have little red dots in the diaper area. If using cloth, the spots usually get progressively worse with time and will usually clear up when you switch to disposables.

The reason that they clear up if you switch to disposables is NOT that disposables are any better than cloth for preventing yeast (in fact they may be somewhat worse as they are less breathable than cloth). However, if you're using cloth and your baby has yeast, then there is yeast on your diapers.

Treating a yeast infection when using cloth diapers is a two-step process.

The first is to actually treat the yeast infection. Speak with your child's doctor to find out what s/he recommends, but usually over-the-counter yeast infection cream will do the trick.

To get the yeast off your diapers, you need to cleanse them with a combination of hot water/cold water cycles. Start by cleaning your diapers. Then run your diapers through 3 hot wash/cold rinse cycles in your washing machine with no detergent. If you dry your diapers in the dryer, they should not have any smell when they come out of the dryer. If they do smell, repeat the 3 x hot water wash/cold water rinse cycle without detergent until they don't.

If you have a high efficiency washing machine, then set the water to the highest setting possible for washing and cleansing your diapers. If you cannot change the water setting on your high efficiency washer, then add 1 or 2 wet towels to the load to trick your washing machine into adding more water.