Vaseline supreme

Natural stuff, that's what you gotta use on your perfect, brand-new, fragile baby's skin, right? Because 'natural' is always safe and healthy, isn't it?

Well, that's certainly the media message we have all got loud and clear. It's so authoritative-sounding that it's hard to disagree because it makes you sound like the kind of mom who doesn't care how many 'chemicals' you rub into your helpless baby. But I have a pet hate for the misuse of words like 'natural', 'organic', 'chemical' and so on, each of which can describe a product that may be either good or bad for you, depending solely on what the product actually is and what else it contains.

It's true that many cosmetics, from very cheap to very expensive, contain substances we probably don't like the sound of. For most consumers, this is because we don't have a degree in chemistry, and so we just don't know what the substance in question actually is, or how it works to do whatever it does. And because science is contantly learning more about the effects of technical creations, some of those substances turn out to do additional things we don't want, especially when combined with many other substances in other products we use.

However, it's worth thinking about why any manufacturer would put something into a product. Usually, each substance does something handy, like change the texture from lumpy to smooth, make it thicker or thinner, stop it degrading on exposure to light or contamination with water, add a pleasant scent, and so on. Also, because animal testing was legal for many decades before vivisectionists began their successful campaigning, there are lots and lots of substances available to manufacturers that are known to be fine in human products because they were once extensively tested on many other mammals.

Such substances are not natural, in the sense that they have been synthesised or processed in a factory or laboratory, but that is often all to the good. If you splosh pure essential oils (which are certainly chemicals) into a hot bath, it will float on the surface, and be heated by the water, and could thus burn the bather hoping for a luxurious wallow. Many natural substances are poisonous, from belladonna (it used to be popular in eyedrops because it dilates pupils, which makes women look aroused and therefore more attractive to men) to arsenic (it used to be used as a treatment for syphilis).

But I digress. As a new mom, I was urged to use olive oil on my baby's skin. because it's natural. Not Vaseline, because it's made from fossil fuels, and who wants that stuff on their baby? Well, I didn't like the way my baby got all slippery and smelled like a rancid Italian hors d'oeuvre. And it didn't help at all with cradle cap.

Now, Vaseline has been used for decades, especially on baby skin. It's a wonderful, stable, scentless, cheap barrier cream, promoting skin healing. And by the way, it occurs naturally (yes, naturally) alongside other petroleum byproducts. Its raw material - before purification to make it clear in colour - is already a good skin healer, and was used by oilfield workers.

I find it's great to use all over my baby after her bath (the water's very hard in our area). And it cleared up cradle cap in just a few days. It's good for preventing nappy rash too.