slightly embarrassed to ask but does everyone bathe their children every day??

[Fluffylox]

I have a 3yo and a baby but only really bath them about 2/3 times a week, baby I'm not so concerned about as currently still too little to get into a mess but should I really be bathing eldest every evening?sometimes I just seem to run out of time of an evening! And if not how do you mommies of daughters make sure the girly bits are cleaned every day I try chasing her around in the morning with a sponge but not really sure if that's sufficient really!

Wow to those whose young DC are bathed every day. When I were a young lass, it was once or twice a week...maybe a little more often if it was summer and we'd been playing out a lot. We're not a sweaty family though.

I do remember before schools got PC that in Year 2 we did a bar-chart of how often pupils in my class had a bath/shower. I was one of the very few...maybe even the only one...who said once a week. And it was in a very non-MN area

Each to their own, you know your DC the best and when they're ready for a wash.

Always. As babies I thought they needed a wash after wearing nappies all the time. Now they are 2 and 4, and go to the toilet themselves I'm not convinced they have the best wiping still! ( although still help younger). So I find it easier to give them a quick shower/ bath before bed as it seems silly to put clean clothes on over unclean skin. Then generally still shower/ bath with one of us so no problem of time

I did when they were babies getting covered in food and sand. But from about age 5 every other day.

Reading this and just looked over at my two. They've both got jam in their hair and sticky faces, DD has muddy tights which have soaked through and DS is covered in dribble and snot. They will both be having a bath every night until they are able to avoid coating themselves in as much mess as possible every day!

Once a week here. Ds 5 is starting to have showers twice a week too but dd 3 will have extra baths if she's dirty or been out in the cold playing. Both DC have poor skin and get very dry and flaky more than that.

Thanks all for the responses. I do like it when I do get to give them a bath before bed and always do if dirty or like some have posted when 3yo at nursery and attempts to wipe own bottom! Think it is a bit judgemental to say laziness as although I'm well aware I'm not perfect (who is!) I find it such a struggle at times when DH working late juggling the cooking an (fresh, healthy, well balanced of course) evening meal, demand bf'ing baby, cleaning teeth, bedtime story etc while keeping to 3yo bedtime esp as she does enjogy a bath and can result in a battle to get her out, also as some have said her hair now fairly long so can also now take a while to dry that before bed.

Ds (18m) has a bath every evening as part of his bedtime routine but not always with soap. He loves it and it relaxes him.

My 2 (2 and 7) are bathed/hair washed every night without fail. As others have said it is part of their wind down routine and only takes 20 minutes max, including applying cream after.

The little one seems to get coated in food and to quote my mother, never put a dirty body in a clean bed!

Can't say I've ever noticed lots of small children smelling of old food and milk Occasionally you'll get one where hygiene seems to be a bit neglected, but most - no way of telling if they are bathed twice a day or twice a week. Most start the day fairly clean, end it fairly grubby, and return the next morning fairly clean again.

The only children I really notice smelling are the ones who live with smokers (few things more grim than a 2 year old whose hair stinks of fags) and those who are caked in perfumes/moisturisers/products. Luckily neither form the majority!

Oh, forgot to add- when oldest dc was a baby, we bathed her every night. When ds came along, he was lucky if he got dunked once a week for the first couple of months of his life! I often do bath time without dh and somehow having a toddler and a newborn in the bath at the same time or even one after the other was just too much for me to handle!

Fluffylox, do what suits you and your family.

There is NOT medical or hygiene reason to bath young children every night.
Yes, it can be a nice part of their bedtime routine, but it can also be an added stress.

Children do NOT smell if not bathed for a night or 2 - that is a ridiculous statement . Stained clothes need to be changed daily, particularly if there are milky/food stains on them; they smell after a while.

You do what you need to do to survive. It's hard to look after a toddler and BF baby - you are doing just fine .

back2basics

You know which ones you suspect are bathed everyday from those that aren't, but you couldn't possibly know that without asking them. However, to do this would be terribly unprofessional of you. For all you know, the ones you suspect could have spilt milk all over them at breakfast, etc etc... You could never know the cause of them smelling without actually asking.

However, I've been teaching for 15 years, and before that (whilst a student) worked as a children's play worker for a few years. In that time, I have never been able to establish a child that bathed daily from one that does not.

So please tell me how do you know (rather than merely make judgements, which could be accurate or inaccurate judgements) without actually asking the children or their parents?

we bathe the boys every day.
have done since they were little, every now and then we have a "grandma wash" as grandma never gives them a bath at her house, just wipes a flannel round their bits.
they are now 7&9 and still bathe every night, DS1 has a shower (his choice) DS2 still has a bath and sometimes a bath with me or DH as he likes it.
It works for us and I couldn't care less what others do with their children or what they think of us.

Mine have a shower or bath roughly every other day but occasionally less if everyone is too tired to bother. Neither smell bad, look grubby, have greasy hair or get picked on by Chitty Chitty Bang Bang-style youngster sniffing Child Catcher people.

No - when we switched to every other day my DSs excema prone skin got so much better.

Ours ds's (8 and 5) have a bath every night.

Ds1 likes a quick shower before school too - to sort his hair out!

when the DC were babies they were both always bringing up cheesy puke, so they definitely got washed every day. Now they're bigger it's every 3 days or so or as needed.

I only ever bathed/showered once a week though, until i was a greasy teen.

Nope. Both of them get awful dry skin if washed too often, so a couple of times a week, maximum.

I'm also avoiding too much hair shampooing, because I fell into the trap of washing mine every day, and it did my scalp no favours. Now I'm back to only washing mine once a week (after a year of greasy hell) it's much better and I don't want them having to go through the same thing.

They don't smell. If they do, I wash them.

lade I have small dc clambering all over me, you tend to notice the ones with grubby necks/ears/fingernails with still the same grubby marks in the same place the next to 3/4 days.

And yes I can see how you would not smell teenagers or older dc, they don't tend to sit on you, hug you and attach themselves like limpets as small dc do. You also don't care for small dc the way you do school aged dc.

Small dc not bathed smell sour, and I do not have a particularly strong sense of smell but this I do notice. Much like being on the bus in the morning commute with adults YES you do smell please don't waft your smelly sweaty UN FRESH bo-ey armpits above my head.

Its like washing the dishes, I was my dishes every night unless I'm being lazy (now and again I am lazy) so the odd night that I am lazy and can't be arsed to run a bath oh well but I don't pretend it's anything but laziness and they would have a quick dip in the morning and I would change their bedsheets if this happens. When my dc stay at my nans they don't have bath and they smell stale the next day like bedsheets the day before you change them.

If our going to be lazy at least be honest and say I don't bath my dc as I can't be arsed.

You definitely shouldn't feel under any pressure to bath your children every day - every other day, or every few days is completely fine!

I have 3dcs aged 2, 6 & 10. We are a very busy family especially now they are older. The end of the day is hectic with dinner, homework, 3 lots of music practise etc to do - a bath is a 2/3 times a week treat these days!!

mostly, yes, because they enjoy it, and it's a nice wind-down at the end of the day.
however on the odd occasion when we do something in the evening, and get home late, we skip bath time, to no ill effect.

It may be lazy for you Back2, for me it's a well-thought out plan.

So Back you notice grubby necks and sour smelling children, but you actually have no idea the frequency with which any of the non-dirty children are bathed?

Well as a community nurse I've had to advise mums to perhaps not bath their children as much as their skin integrity wasnt as good as it should be - follow up and all was well with reduced bathing.

You may want your children to be squeaky clean but it completely depends on their day to day activities, how messy they are, how active they are. Most children under 6 do not need more than 2-3 baths a week.

I don't think anyone should be judging another mother's bathing routine and saying it's 'lazy'. They know their child better than you do.

To be honest I don't think it's really necessary to bathe children under 2Yrs everynight. I bath my DS about 2/3 times a week unless he's had a messy pooey nappy which has gone everywhere then yeah i will dunk him in a bath as soon as!! haha