A Clean Child is Overrated… Right?
So I was at a work lunch sitting with some fellow parents and the topic of “When do you spend time with your children?” came up. Like, for full-time working parents, it’s hard to feel like you get to spend quality time with your children after making dinner, packing for the next day, putting them down at a decent time… and baths…
Well, when I mentioned baths, they were like… “oh no, we don’t do baths everyday.”
WHAT????
So maybe a clean child is overrated?
They proceeded to say that their children get baths around 2 to 3 times a week. The dirtier the better right?
Another parent based her philosophy of not bathing on the fact that lice like clean hair, and there is no way she is dealing with lice.
So let me back up. I give my kids a bath EVERY SINGLE NIGHT. I totally feel like the germs that get on them at daycare need to be washed off, and in general, my kids are not clean eaters, so baths after dinner seems like a necessity to us.
But, we don’t like having to do them. Literally, my husband and I will wait around until one of us volunteers to give our kids their baths. It’s an exhausting procedure that neither one of us looks forward to.
So to hear that other parents are not cleaning their kids every night.. I was mind-blown. Could I really only bathe my kids a couple nights a week and free up some of our evening time together?
So I decided to research the topic. Did you know, that there isn’t a right or wrong answer? According to Healthline, it is totally okay not to bathe your children every night. They acknowledge the fact that sometimes, parents just don’t have time to monitor and supervise bath time, which is necessary for children under the age of 4. They also make note that not all germs are bad, since it is still a critical for the immune system to develop.
But they also say, that it’s totally okay to bathe your children every night too.
I always just assumed it was best to do baths every night. At least now, I can relax about it a little more, and if we are having a night full of to-do’s or meltdowns, we can simply skip the bath and wait for the next night.
It’s been hard for me to accept that germs are okay and my babies going to sleep dirty is okay, but I’m working on it 🙂 It IS nice to know that I’m still a good mom either way, lol.
It’s amazing what conversations with other parents will bring to light. I’m glad I had this one :). Spread the word!
Love, Brittany
Do you bathe your children every night?
