Wearing tighty whities as a leak guard under a diaper.

I have been wearing diapers for years and years as a DL. Every now and then I wear to bed, hoping that THIS TIME I can wet my diaper in bed without it leaking out of the sides. I have switched to cloth recently, which I really like by the way, but found that even with the absorption that cloth provides on the side of the diaper, and even with tucking in my plastic pants, I still get leaks.

I believe this is mostly due to releasing a lot while laying down. I had the idea of wearing some briefs underwear under my diaper to act as a leak guard. I think this could keep all liquids funneled in the diaper area for a long enough period of time for the diaper to keep up. Any thoughts? I recently got rid of my thighty whities so I need to go out and get some to give this a shot.

Are you wearing just cloth diapers and then plastic pants over the cloth diaper? I ask because I actually wear Goodnites, a cloth diaper over that, and then plastic pants and I never leak. I could wear just cloth diapers and plastic pants and I wouldn't leak, but the Goodnites control the smell issue in the morning, something my wife appreciates.

I'm guessing that your plastic pants are not covering the diaper. I wear Leakmaster high backs, which is a higher cut plastic pant, so that the cloth diaper stays well within the plastic pants. I have a 32" waist and wear small sized plastic pants, if that helps. It's a little tight around the legs and waist, but not much and I think that helps as well.

A cloth diaper shouldn't leak if your plastic pants completely covers the cloth diaper and...and this is important....you don't flood the cloth diaper, meaning that there's more liquid than the diaper can hold. Once there is extra liquid which would collect on the bottom of your plastic pants if you were standing, there is a great chance of it leaking. Ideally, a thick cloth diaper should be able to handle two or three wettings before it maxes out. I wear night weight gauze pre-folds. Twill would probably last longer than gauze but I haven't been able to find them in size small in a long time.

So, make sure you have a very absorbent cloth diaper, preferably night weight pre-fold or flat if you know how to fold one, and higher backed plastic pants.

I am using leak master plastic pants as well. I had been using the standard pull on but I also recently purchased their deluxe plastic pants and the high backed ones, they arrived today so I will be trying them out. The standard plastic pants were fully covering the diaper. The most recent try I did was a flooding. I was wearing diapers all day, had some drinks and kept wearing my diaper to bed, which I ended up wetting in my sleep. It was already wet and obviously was flooded while I slept so there were contributing factors to the leakage but I was able to wet in it some more once awake.

Have you ever put large boosters horizontally extending to the edge of (or even beyond) the wings? Plus a large booster down the center?

I don't know exactly what cloth diaper you're wearing, but you should know that cloth diapers should be layered for your needs. One single prefold diaper, an AIO diaper by itself will only soak up so much. Once the front is saturated and you continue to use it, it'll seek the lowest route once it's no longer being absorbed. They also don't have near the capacity of premium disposables that we have available.

Disposables are the same way, even the best couldn't instantly deal with a flood.

What type of cloth diaper are you using?

I have a rather thick combination that I use that gives me a larger capacity. My prefold is from Baby Pants. I also use a dozen toddler prefolds to stuff in it by folding them in thirds and making three 2x2 layers of additional padding. Sometimes I fold up a Terry bath towel to stuff in as well. Terry has a great capacity as well. Prefold cloth diapers can be customized to fit your needs. One single prefold just won't do what you want it to do. Remember when you use lots of cloth diapers, you're never wasting and can wear them as thick as you want.

Another thing to try is to roll up the side panels towards the middle to create a leak guard. You can also control the flow of your flooding a little bit to give the diaper time to absorb.

As others have stated, if you leak with one diaper use two, or three or whatever number it takes to keep the bed dry. With multiple cloth diapers and plastic pants I can flood during the night in any position pointed any direction without leaking. Can’t say that with disposables.