Need advice for hard well water issue

[BeachMinded]

I am going to begin cloth diapering my 7 mo ds but we have a well and have incredibly hard water full of minerals. When I wash my regular laundry any type of food or organic stains actually seem to come out looking just as bad as when they went in (they turn a strange grayish color). The only thing that works somewhat is soaking in oxyclean prior to washing. If anyone else CDs and deals with these issues I would love to know your routine, products you use, etc. I'm determined to do this but DH is not on board because he thinks we'll never be able to get the dipes clean enough. Please help.

[AustinAmber]

from Delaware!

I have hard city water so it might not be the same, but the only thing that helps me is Calgon added to every load of dipes. And Calgon is not cheap. I do a warm rinse cycle with only Calgon to get out the poo, then a hot cycle with detergent (Country Save) and Calgon with an extra rinse at the end. I really didn't have a problem for about a year and a half then my pocket diapers started leaking. I've stripped them and it doesn't help. I feel like no matter what I do there is always a residue left behind from the hard water. Now I wish I didn't spend the money I did on pockets because I mostly use prefolds now due to the leaking issue. DS is 2. When I need to strip the prefolds I buy a few gallons of distilled water (about $1 a gal.) and boil them in that.

[BeachMinded]

Yea a fellow Delaware mom! I looked for the Calgon and can't find it at the grocery store. Where do you buy yours? I am thinking that I will have to go to all prefolds and covers simply because I don't think the AIOs are going to ever get completely clean. It's so frusturating and I hate to prove DH correct because he wants to abandon the cloth idea entirely and just use sposies. He even balked at the Seventh Generation sposies I wanted to buy for trips out because he said they looked like garbage bags and would be uncomfortable. Well hello luv, that's why I choose cloth. So much comfier. What a frusturating situation, lol.

[AustinAmber]

Well, I'm up north here in Hockessin, but I can find Calgon pretty much anywhere. Acme, KMart, Target. I have also been able to boil fitted dipes with plastic snaps with no problem. But if you want to cover the cost of Calgon, go with prefolds for sure. A great agument for cloth is that if you are planning to have more kids you won't have to buy anymore diapers at all!

[Galatea]

You can use OxiClean Free on all your diaper loads. Calgon is the key, though. Or install a whole-house softener... so worth it!

[BeachMinded]

We were actually thinking about the whole house softener and wondered whether it would be worth the investment. I think we may wind up doing that as all of our laundry and showers suffer from the hard water. In the meantime I went ahead and ordered Calgon online as I can't seem to find it at any of my local stores. I also ordered some Planet detergent, thought I'd give it a try. I'm on the quest for the perfect combo for fresh clean dipes, lol. Thanks for the help ladies. It is much appreciated.