Bathing new baby - seeking advice and opinions please

[smoggii]

Hi

Our PFB is 8 days old and so far, on the advice of MW just been topping an tailing. When should we start bathing her properly. What are the advantages to bathing over cleaning with cotton wool/warm water.

Thanks

A lovely warm bath will get her cleaner I should imagine. I found that my newborns had very sensitive skin and needed a bath quite often because they pood so much!

Also, have you tried a tummy tub? They ae billiant and both my little boys loved being bathed in one.

Congratulations on your new baby :)

Both times the (different) hospitals had bathed them before we went home around 3 days old anyway.
I was bathing mine regularly by the second week. I felt better knowing the navel/chord was bring washed properly (find it helps it drop off and I feel better when it's gone!!) and it gave a rhythm to our (every other or so) day.

Mine hated the baby bath at first, think it unsettled them being laid back, so I popped them upright in a trug (like a bucket with handles previously used for toys) and they were both better with that.

Congrats!

My lo had her first bath at 2 weeks old - definitely felt she was getting cleaner by having a proper bath and it's good to get them used to water/splashing.

She's now 8 months old and up until this week we've bathed her every other day as her skin had a tendency to get dry otherwise xx

Xpost! Tummy tub is the baby bath version of my bucket too!

Didn't start doing a proper bath til about three weeks I think, and then only once every few days. Their skin is so new and sensitive, water can really dry it out and it just seemed unnecessary.

my son is 3 weeks old and has only had 3 baths. his first was when he was about 2 weeks old as he was in special care for a while.

The health visitor suggested we bath him to calm him down before bed but so far we've not got into any kind of routine.

We found that a bath every other day helped us mark out the difference between day and night. Don't know if DD took any notice... She loved having a bath though. Don't use any products in the bath.

A bath just seems nicer and if you don't use any products in the water and rub in some olive oil afterwards then it is very gentle on newborn skin.

Ds1 and ds2 were bathed in hospital. i think on day 2 or 3. MW's just suggested it and i thus did it.
and then i continued it. sometimes they got in the bath with me, or i bathed them in the main tub. I loved doing it and they loved it.

I only made sure I didn't do it that often becasue i took on board what people and mw's etc said about if you did it too much it prob did more harm than good, i.e drying their skin out.
plus they probably don't even need a bath. at all. I mean they aren't DIRTY, are they ?

But if they like it and you like it, why not ?

Don't undertand why we are all so scared of bathing newborns. where does this scaredness come from ?
If you take care, what are the risks, exactly ?
Go and enjoy OP. Or if you or dd don't like it, then you don't need to do it till you do, do you ?

Both my boys have loved water, swimming and baths since the day they were born. Your dd might aswell. You never know.

it's nice as part of an evening routine.

It's nice to get a baby used to having them and can be a really lovely time of day with them as however fractious they are, baths seem to fascinate and calm them down.

best technique first couple of times is to wrap baby in a muslin and hold close to your chest as you immerse yourself in the bath, then gradually loosen the muslin til they are fully skin in water...seems to make it a gentle introduction to (non amniotic) bathing.

however, if your baby has v sensitive skin bathing even if just with water may exacerbate (just from wetting the skin) so watch that one and play it by ear.

hth