As a soon to be parent, you shouldn’t be surprised with the fact that humidifiers rank highly on the list of essential baby nursery gear list. The truth is, a properly humidified nursery room means only health benefits for your little bundle of joy.
One of the advantages, for example, is preventing your newborn’s skin from drying up. And, believe us, that young, sensitive skin will easily become dry and start peeling, especially if your latest family member arrived during the winter.
Besides dry skin, the dry winter air (even drier inside when the heating system kicks in) brings other health issues such as nasal congestion, sinus flare ups, and an overall fussiness of the baby due the inability to breath and sleep normally.
This only means that you won’t sleep that well as well, and become tired and stressed out. So, to prevent that from happening, consider investing (not that big of an investment actually) in a humidifier for your baby nursery room.
But, before you do that, let’s take a look at the main benefits of having a humidifier in your baby’s nursery room.
Helps with nasal congestion
There isn’t a single nose on the planet that enjoys the dry air, and that especially goes for little honkers that are still adjusting to breathing the air. Dry air, especially winter air (and especially the indoor air dried up even more by the heating systems), is the main culprit for sinus flare ups, nasal congestion, sore throats, and bad sleep.
However, with a properly humidified nursery room, you can avoid these health issues. How? Well, when your baby breathes in air that is moisture rich, the nasal passages get nicely lubricated and become slippery. This means that the bacteria infused mucous that causes congestions and flare ups, get thrown out much easier and faster. The results are clean nasal passages and sinus cavities, easier breathing, and much, much better sleep (both for your baby and yourself).
And, if you want some useful tips about choosing the right humidifier for your baby, we recommend that you check out Leona Maurer’s buying guide.
Cold symptoms relief
Every parent, dreads from having to watch his baby suffer from a cold or a flu, and not being able to help. Since babies can’t use cold syrups or antibiotics, what is there left to do?
The answer is – Humidifiers. Since you can’t kill the bacteria or the virus with antibiotics, you can help your baby get rid of the cause, the mucous, and recover much easier and sooner. Your baby will have “slippery” nasal passages, throat, and even lungs, and the mucous won’t stick and cause congestion and fever.
After just one night with the humidifier running, you will notice how your baby feels better and stronger, just from coughing up the mucous (or from “vacuuming” the nose with the nasal aspirator).
Dry skin prevention
As a first-time parent, you aren’t actually aware of how sensitive your newborn’s skin is and how it will scale in the first few weeks. Of course, there’s no need to panic when this starts as it’s completely normal because your baby’s skin is still adjusting to the outside environment.
However, if you don’t moisturize your baby’s skin, it can become too dry and crack, and this can get complicated. To prevent such a situation, the doctors will prescribe baby skin creams. But, if your baby is welcomed into the world during the winter when the air is especially dry, using just the creams won’t cut it.
This is where the humidifiers jump in and save the day. The mist that is released in the air, doesn’t benefit just the respiratory system, it also moisturizes the skin and makes it soft and elastic. Thus, the skin adjustment period will be much shorter and easier to handle.
Better sleep
One of the main reasons why babies wake up during the night (in the first week or so) besides being hungry, is because they still have some amniotic fluid left in their lungs after birth. It is completely normal and the amount varies from baby to baby, but they all cough it up and start breathing normally and with the full capacity of their little lungs.
But, this also means congestion and waking up during the night, and that means that as the days go by, your irregular sleeping patterns will start taking their tool and you will start feeling tired and stressed out.
To help your baby get rid of amniotic fluid as fast as possible, we recommend using a humidifier. Just like with the cold or a flu, when the nasal passages are nicely moisturized and slippery, the congestion is extremely hard to form. Thus, your baby will breath normally and sleep like… well, a baby.
Needles to say that you will sleep much better as well, and feel fresh and ready for new adventures in the morning.