sterilising for babies

[Bonniegirl]

Annpan you said:

"The instinct in me tells me just to be clean, not sterile."

Go with your instints, t's so frustrating that these fools think we are incapable of thinking for ourselves.

Just smile sweetly and ignore them!

[Annpan]

Well my baby is now 8 months old and I still sterilise bottles but nothing else, and I am trying to wean off the bottle all-together. By her 1st birthday I hope to return the steriliser to the lady who I borrowed it from . If I had been breast-feeding then I would have stopped sterilising a good while ago -It is a long and painful story as to why I couldn't breast-feed, I'd rather not go in to just now.

As everyone agrees it is impossible once they start moving around, (unless you cage them up in a sterilised playpen) I try to keep as clean as possible and as yet she has not been ill. I don't use much antibac type stuff, I reckon that the toxins and chemicals in it are as bad as dirt (if not worse)

[Welsh Girls Allotment]

re health visitors I was lucky in the beginning I had an 'older' lady in her 50's and she was sensible practical and we got on well, I used to take daughter to the clinic just for a chat on the way to my mothers !

unfortunately she retired and was replaced by an utter jobsworth one size fits all type of woman I had a row over my daughters skin with her, now and again she has a reaction to bath products and has a bit of a rash which I treat with goats milk - when h.v. quizzed me and I explained she said that I shouldn't take matters into my own hands and should immediately see the doctor I explained that I did not want strong creams for my baby and goats milk sorts it out but she would not listen - I never went back.

She was not prepared to listen and as somebody else said had no children of her own.

Your instincts are a very powerful tool, listen to them

[catalyst]

i reckon your 'instinct' will tell you whats best.
we never sterilised anything - i didnt want those chemical residues in my babies!! hot water is generally good enough. my kids spent their first few years constantly covered in muck, jam, and god knows what else - a healthy bit of dirt makes a healthy immune system!
i cant believe that people believe the adverts, and even sterilise their salad veg now before eating it. crazy world.

[Clara]

Just found this post and it made me chuckle to think that maybe I should sterilise the kittens and dogs as my 7 month old daughter seems most keen on putting them in her mouth at the moment....usually when they are trying to lick the porridge off her face

Good job no health visitor´s gonna bother to walk to my house I think they´d lock me up.

Clean(ish) yes, sterile no. I once saw a documentary about germs and they showed an example of a swedish village where the air quality was fantastic but most of the children had asthma....the culprit was thought to be the fact that the houses were so clean that the children´s immune system was turning in on itself and creating allergies to things we can normally cope with. I also read an article in the New Scientist a couple of years back linking asthma to reduced exposure to some micro organism usually found in soil. So eating dirt is a natural part of healthy development.....

Clara x.

[mrsflibble]

yeah, but even without sterilisation kids can still get asthma. I thoght I'd done really well and set sophie up with an immune system to be proud of, but she's still turned out to be asthmatic.

[Clara]

yeah, but even without sterilisation kids can still get asthma. I thoght I'd done really well and set sophie up with an immune system to be proud of, but she's still turned out to be asthmatic.

Of course, I´m not saying it´s always the fault of neurotic parents! Just that asthma rates have increased not only because of pollution and the like but also because we live in a culture which believes that covering everything in chemicals is somehow healthier for us.

Clara x.

[mrsflibble]

oh goodness I totally agree with you on that!!

[glenniedragon]

I have a friend, who to protect the innocent we will call A and her daughter R, the health visitor popped round to see her. No sign of R anywhere A and HV chatting at the table when A became aware of something sitting on her feet, looking under the table she found R and the dog both chewing the same hide bone- one at each end! luckily she had one of the good HVs, social services not hurridly contacted! R is a good healthy girl, with lovely hair/coat

kind thoughts
Deb

[Silver Ether]

if you constantly try to do the sterile thing, childrens immume systeme will never get up and running properly. Clean is good ... baby feeding bottles do get very yukky because of the milk ... but I never steralised for mine using chemicals just boiling water as suggested by the GP ... and they survived ... and so have the 50+ children that have been in my care and most of them came to me at a few months old ... I am a vetern childminder ...

[mrsflibble]

R is a good healthy girl, with lovely hair/coat

hahahahaha!!!!!!!! mine would have called the social and taken soph with her I think.