Summer is approaching and, although it is not a scorching heat, at least where I live, there are days that if you happen to do an excursion to the mountain, or if we are going to go to the beach, it is worth being careful so that Do not burn children.
If they are older, there is not much problem, we put cream on them or we protect them with some clothes and that's it. But when they are babies we have more doubts because It is usually recommended not to put sunscreen on the baby before six months. Is this true? It can not? And so, what do we do?
How did we live when there were no creams?
First things first, imagination and common sense. Sun cream is a recent invention, so somehow we had to live when there were no creams. Moreover, we go to the beach or the mountain with our babies from time to time, but on the beach and in the mountains there are people who live there and who also have children who live there all year. Since I don't think they're creaming at all hours, it would be nice to know what they do to avoid burning.
Since I don't have anyone who lives there to ask right now, I will choose to apply logic. If the sun burns, because our skin is not used to it, then let's try to avoid it. Babies' skin is sensitive, true, but we do not wear the child naked all day, so we can put fresh clothes, light colors that do not absorb heat, loose if we are with relatively high temperatures and a hat or visor that Give shade to the face.
With that, only with that, we have already minimized a lot of possible burns in several areas of the body, although obviously there are still bare areas such as arms and legs. Then we must be the ones who run away from the sun a little. Nothing happens if you give it a while. We go out, take a walk or go shopping and go home, for example. Now, if the walk is one hour along the promenade, where there is not a shadow, we will have the child an entire hour exposed to the sun, and then we will burn. Let's apply, then, the logic.
Short walks, through areas of sun and shade, and leaving at hours where the sun does not affect vertically, which are those that go from 12 noon to 16 in the afternoon. If you hurry me, we extend the strip to 11 and 17, since we talk about babies under 6 months and in summer the sun can wreak havoc if we trust each other.
Now you will tell me that "yes, but I go to the beach for a while and there is no shadow worth it". Well, nothing, you go to the beach for a little while soon in the morning or late in the afternoon, you put the umbrella so that the baby is under, and after a while you return home. The umbrella protects from the rays that come from above, but sand and water have the ability to bounce the sun's rays and in the hours of strong sun it can be dangerous to stay for a long time. It is not as dangerous as direct sun, but we must also take it into account.
So can we only do this?
No, and it is not "only", which is a lot. We are covering the child, looking for shadows and we are taking it to the street when the sun does not burn so much. Alone with that we will avoid many problems.
Sun cream before six months?
Ok, in addition to what we have said, the other possibility is to put cream. Is this possible or not? Well no and yes. If the cream is from chemical filter, which are the usual ones that we buy for us, are not recommended, because we talk about chemical elements that the baby's skin will absorb, causing allergies and irritations.
Instead, if the cream is from physical filter, we are talking about different components, which are not absorbed and, therefore, produce much less skin reactions (better if we had one without nanoparticles, because it is not clear that they are not harmful). These yes babies under six months can be put If we consider it necessary.
In any case, if we only had one of chemical factor, the American Academy of Pediatrics recommends avoiding it or putting very little and in very specific areas (arms and legs, for example, which is where they usually sunbathe). But then I leave a doubt: And vitamin D?
Babies need their skin to contact daylight to synthesize vitamin D (and we, of course). In case of applying creams with factor 8 or higher, or physical filter creams, the amount of sunlight that our skin will capture is minimal, and therefore we will synthesize very little vitamin D.
So in the face of this dilemma, I would say that better avoid creams if possible, have the baby less than six months or more, at least for 20 minutes a day (as Mother Tiger told us) and then do things with common sense. If we go to the beach, cream. If we are not going to go, and we are only going to walk through areas of sun and shade, then clothes and we are watching.
Although eye, if you are taking oral vitamin D, we have more freedom to put the cream at home.
