Some Common Baby Problems and Their Remedies

When you're a brand new mother, you are inexperienced and panicky. You question every little thing that seems out of place, referencing books, the web, your family & friends, and your doctor. After a couple more children, you can officially be called the "Experienced Mother" and have all the wise advice to hand off to new mothers.

I've had 3 babies and they were all learning experiences. Just when you think you've seen it all, they surprise you! Here are 3 types of problems and the remedies I learned from the encounters.

CRADLE CAP: Even today many people think this arises from neglect, not washing the baby enough, or washing the baby too much. The scaly, slightly yellowish crust seems to appear on your baby's scalp amazingly fast. It is simply a buildup of skin oils and skin cells. Our bodies naturally slough off skin cells all the time, our scalps included. There is also a theory that the baby's hormones are still very high from being in the mother's womb and that causes overactive skin growth, pushing the older cells off much faster than normal.

It is very simple to remove the scaly crust. Gently massage baby oil all over your baby's scalp. Make sure you saturate all areas that have the cradle cap. Leave the oil on for about an hour. You should be able to see the crust actually cracking and loosening as the oil softens it up. If little bits start to come up when you brush your baby's hair with a soft baby brush or baby comb, then the crust is ready to be removed.

Wash your baby's head careful with baby shampoo. Use the baby brush to help loosen the scales off of your baby's scalp. If your baby has hair, use a baby comb to get the scales out of her hair. Rinse well and you're done!

Some suggest using Vaseline, but I've found that baby oil (which is just mineral oil with fragrance) is the easiest to use and works perfectly.

DIAPER RASH: Don't beat yourself up if your baby gets diaper rash. It is not necessarily a sign of neglecting diaper duty. Some babies will get the rash even if you change them more than regularly. If your child has sensitive skin, they may develop the rash simply as a reaction to the natural ammonias in their urine.

To help prevent diaper rash there are several things you can do. Make sure your baby's bottom is clean and dry with each diaper change. Use a corn starch powder (I found this works better than the talc powders) or rub on a thin protective layer of Vaseline (generic petroleum jelly is fine), or A&D ointment after each change. A&D is a commonly found brand name for baby ointments. Usually found in the baby product aisles. It comes in tubes (like toothpaste) and has a couple different varieties. The regular A&D Ointment looks a lot like Vaseline when you squeeze it out, but it is thicker and more gel-like than petroleum jelly.

If your baby does get a diaper rash, treat it with A&D Medicated Ointment. This white cream also comes in tubes and contains Zinc Oxide which soothes, protects and helps to heal the rash. Excellent stuff, I always made sure I had a tube handy with all of my kids.

FOREIGN OBJECTS

Kids will be kids, and often that means shoving a small object somewhere on their body where it doesn't belong. Whether it's candy bits in the ear, cereal up the nose or strange things going into the mouth, you're most likely going to encounter SOMETHING where it doesn't belong!

Mouth: Infants and toddlers will put anything and everything into their mouths. This is how they learn and explore the world around them. You have to be diligent about keepings things out of their reach that might be harmful in their mouths, including small objects that they could swallow and get stuck in their throat. You should study up on the Heimlich Maneuver (see links below).

Ear: A nasal aspirator (bulb syringe) is an excellent tool and is found in most baby care kits. Use it in reverse to suck out small objects that might be stuck at the very opening of the ear canal. Squeeze the bulb first, then ever so carefully place as near to the object as possible (you don't want to push it in any further), and release the bulb. As long as the object is not too tightly lodged, this process works well.

If it is a meltable object like candy. Try placing a few drops of warm water into the ear and then sucking out with the aspirator.

If the object is tightly lodged, then see your child's physician.

**NEVER USE Q-TIPS or cotton swabs TO TRY TO REMOVE AN OBJECT AS THIS will end up pushing the object in further and CAN CAUSE HARM to your child's ear.**

Nose: If the object is lodged and won't come out when they blow their nose, the nasal aspirator and tweezers are your tools of choice, depending on the size and shape of the lodged object. If the object has a shape where you can grab a good part of it with tweezers, carefully pinch the nose behind the object to prevent it from being pushed in further while you reach in with the tweezers.

If it's more of a round object, try the nasal aspirator as a suction tool.

Again, if nothing works, call the doctor.

NOTE: The nasal aspirator and tweezers are good for removing objects from the belly button too.

Eyes: Eye wash and/or saline solution are good to have around the house. If you wear contacts, you're going to have a saline solution anyway, and this is excellent for washing out dust, dirt or other things that might get in your child's eyes. The trickiest part is getting their eye to stay open while you try to wash it out. Eye cups can help for most people, but they never seemed to work for my kids. So I just have them tilt their head back, look off to the side with their eyes only, and then I hold their eyelid while pouring/dripping the solution onto their eye.

If it's an unfamiliar liquid that gets into your child's eyes, call Poison Control first before doing anything just to make sure that it's ok to wash it out yourself. If it's metallic dust or debris - call a physician immediately as metal can cause permanent damage to the eye.

Heimlich Maneuver:

Younger than 1 year: http://firstaid.webmd.com/tc/choking-rescue-procedure-heimlich-maneuver-baby-younger-than-1-year

1 year old to Adult: http://firstaid.webmd.com/tc/choking-rescue-procedure-heimlich-maneuver-adult-or-child-older-than-1-year

Poison Control: 1-800-222-1222