We did EC with DD, so I agree with your feeling that staying in a wet dipe all night is icky.
Speaking as an EC'er, my suggestion would be to try peeing him at night. Since you're already co-sleeping and frequently nursing at night, it's not too tricky to do. When he wakes, simply take off whatever he's wearing for a dipe, and hold him over a bowl or baby potty (kept beside the bed) while you start to nurse. This would be sitting up of course. Once he's peed, you can put the potty back beside the bed (carefully
) and lie back down.
There's a few interesting facts that most western parents aren't aware of, that I didn't know about before learning about EC, that make this a really awesome thing to do.
For instance, most babies don't pee while sleeping. The muscles that control peeing are "turned off" in sleep. You have to at least partially rouse in order for the muscles to wake up enough to relax and pee. As babies get older, and learn that they're expected to simply pee in their pants then go back to sleep, they rouse less and less. But when they're still young, it's quite reliable. So if you get them onto a potty pretty quickly when they just start to stir -- you'll catch the pee and keep the diaper dry!
Another is that babies will usually pee pretty soon after waking, no matter whether they woke up because they had to pee or they were hungry or scared or whatever. Again, because the muscles are 'turned off' while asleep, they'll pee once they wake up. So even if you don't do EC at all during the day, a quick sit on a potty whenever they wake up will save you many, many diapers over time, it's an almost guaranteed 'catch'.
Another is the fact that babies frequently wake up specifically because they have to pee -- it's pretty uncomfortable!! And because we as western parents generally have been led to believe that our babies have no control and even no
awareness of the feeling of having to pee, we never consider that as a reason for night-waking. And so, as good, well-intentioned attachment parents, we try to nurse them back to sleep. But it's not nursing they were after (though they'll usually accept it as comfort) -- it's the pressure and discomfort of the need to pee, and then a minute later, it's the discomfort of the wet diaper.
Among moms who EC, a common signal that babe has to pee is popping on and off the breast. This usually signifies that they're not saying NO to nursing (nursing is wonderful, of course they love it!) -- but that there's something else distracting them. I found this all the time when DD would wake at night. I would automatically stick the boob in her mouth, but if she started playing with it or popping off, I'd think "oh, right, maybe she has to pee." A quick potty-tunity, and yup, there it is.
Then, ECing parents frequently find that after the night-time pee, they'll often drift right back to sleep BY THEMSELVES, without needing to nurse! Especially once they're used to the routine and it's not something new and different. They'll rouse just enough to relax and pee, but once done, well DD was sometimes mostly back to sleep again just still sitting on the potty. Now she did still usually need to nurse to fully get back to sleep again, but only a little. It varies from kid to kid. But that was proof enough that she was not waking due to hunger or a need to nurse for comfort.
As for getting them quickly onto the potty, this can be tricky when wearing conventional diapers, but you can do things like wrap them well but not fasten tightly, and especially, don't wear pants or onesies or full-on sleepers. Babylegs or other leggings if it's chilly, otherwise just the diaper. Once we had the nighttime EC routine figured out, DD would usually wear a simple prefold just tucked around her and held in place with a stretchy prefold belt -- I'd just slip the front of the prefold out of the belt, potty, slip it back under the belt, done. She would sleep on a waterproof mat on the bed, too, just in case.
Then we went to just using cloth training pants. This was SO much easier than regular diapers, even during the day. If your goal is just to prevent huge spills when you miss a pee, and not to hold and contain multiple pees before changing the diaper, then all you need is a small, trim trainer, not as absorbent as the mega-diapers many cloth diapers tend to be these days. Plus, as you've discovered, as babies get older they HATE lying down to be changed. But if they can stay standing up, it's not so bad.
The only downside to trainers is in case of poop, of course.
But there are trainers that have snap-sides as well, so there's the option to take them off in diaper-style if needed. And those who EC find that poop misses are really rare, it's just the pee to protect. But I'm talking about during the day here -- you're just talking about at night. Most babies (as has been mentioned here) don't poop at night much anymore as they get older, so there shouldn't be a problem with trainers.
Anyway, that's just some thoughts for you to consider from the perspective of an ECer.
