my experience is leakage happens from over-discharge, and not really any other time.  

Shelly, I pretty much agree with all the advice you have received.  As I'm not sure of that, I decided to Google "Batteries in the washing machine" to see what came up.  There are many links, but a post in this one made this suggestion:

 

"I would call the poision control center and see what they can tell you: 1-800-222-1222"

 

The person did and this was the response:

 

"Thanks. I just called and I was told to wash the clothes a couple times, and they should be safe and that the problem is that the alkaline in the battery can cause a burn, but after washing the clothes a few times, it should get out and be safe to wear."

 

It's funny, most of the people were worried whether or not the batteries were still good and not about the clothes or washer.

A front loader should have a clean cycle that you're supposed to run it through (once a month or so, IIRC) -- perhaps now would be a good time to run it through that cycle.

 

Juan can probably speak better to this, but the only time you don't want to use water is when it's on the skin, because it'll spread it before it dilutes it, but even in the cases of emergency, you still want to run water -- you just want to make sure you use enough water to completely wash it off.  Juan, I realize this isn't your area of expertise, but is this something you know about?

A front loader should have a clean cycle that you're supposed to run it through (once a month or so, IIRC) -- perhaps now would be a good time to run it through that cycle.

 

Juan can probably speak better to this, but the only time you don't want to use water is when it's on the skin, because it'll spread it before it dilutes it, but even in the cases of emergency, you still want to run water -- you just want to make sure you use enough water to completely wash it off.  Juan, I realize this isn't your area of expertise, but is this something you know about?

Peter, I honestly used to think I new something about something, right now I realize it was all in my head, I don't know anything about much anything, as evaluated by my jobless situation. Perhaps I should keep quiet and not be blabbering about batteries and leaks...

It's all good, Shelly.  Rinse the sheets again to be safe, but a little bit of already-diluted potassium hydroxide isn't going to do much damage to anyone or anything.

 

It's funny, most of the people were worried whether or not the batteries were still good and not about the clothes or washer.

 

Yeah, most of the hits for battery washing machine were about whether they could still use the battery.  

Shelly,

 

In all seriousness, in addition to the sound advice given in this thread the only battery that you ever need to be really worried about is a 9V battery.  I'm honestly surprised that they still exist in their current configuration.  The proximity of the terminals and propensity to short out in multiple situations, including disposal, is actually something to consider.

 

But AA's?  Just toss them and forget about it.  But that said, we do lots of things in life just to feel better about something so if it'll give you a little piece of mind my advice is to wash the sheets and rest easy.

^^ New 9V batteries come with a little plastic cap on the negative terminal, or a plastic strap across both terminals.  I transfer that to the old battery before disposing of it to prevent it shorting.