How often and how do you bath your baby? As I was bathing my six month old last night, I started wondering about that? Have people always bathed infants as much as we tend to do now? And could all these baths have anything to do with the prevelance of ear infections?

Sometimes I think too much.

You know, so many people bathe their children every single day it seems these days. When I was growing up, we had a shower twice a week and wash cloth cleanings for dirty spots in between. Kid's don't have body odor and only need to get the dirt off of them. Over bathing can dry out skin.

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Umbilical Cord Blood Storage | Breastfeeding Advice and Information

I bathe my two month old about once every four days. She just doesn't need to be bathed every night. Her skin seems a little sensitive, and I think too many baths would be bad for her. Not to mention that it's hard to fit baths into the routine right now. I figure by the time she's four months old she will be getting bathed about every other night. When she starts on solids it will go to every day because she'll be a mess.

I started out on the every day bandwagon, but soon went down to two or three times a week and just made sure that diaper change time was thorough and face and had washes were prevelant. Sometimes I think to much water can work against you in the ear infection scenario. My son had four sets of tubes, and now when he gets an ear infection, he never has pain - just a raging fever before we know to even get started onthe antibiotic.

I was bathing my son every day and I noticed his skin was breaking out. Babies' skin is very sensitive so I backed off and only bathed him about twice a week. His skin cleared up after that.

I actually still bathe Alex once a day, but this is actually at the ped's recommendation. My son is very hot natured and sweats during the day. When I don't bathe him once a day (and I've tried just wiping off) he breaks out. He just likes to do the opposite of most other babies to keep me on my toes. I do skip on washing his head, generally every couple of days so I don't get water in his ears. I just wipe off the back of his neck and behind his ears where the gunk hangs out.

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Tigriz
Mom to Alex - 1/21/06

I guess that all goes to show how different things work for different people! People should really just pay attention to their baby's reaction and go by that instead of what someone else tells them to do I think. (except perhaps the doctor!)

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Umbilical Cord Blood Storage | Breastfeeding Advice and Information

I think bathing a baby every day is overdoing it. I bathe my baby every three days, I started out doing it more often, but her skin was getting really dry. This seems to work well for us.

Where do you bath baby? I can remember being bathed in the kitchen sink when I was little, but I don't hear of anyone doing that any more. Usually I bath my new baby in the tub with me.