Wellness  

Your Bed Sheet Could Be The Reason You Keep Getting Skin Irritations

By Rukevwe Ochuko

27 February 2020   |   5:06 pm

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The human skin is like a delicate flower when touched or handled roughly it could wear and tear. Only when properly groomed and hydrated daily would it bloom and glow. Nevertheless, keeping the skin healthy isn’t just by thoroughly bathing, staying hydrated, eating lots of vegetables and using natural skin products, it also involves keeping…

Your bed sheet could be the reason you keep getting skin irritations | Image: Bauce Magazine

The human skin is like a delicate flower when touched or handled roughly it could wear and tear. Only when properly groomed and hydrated daily would it bloom and glow. Nevertheless, keeping the skin healthy isn’t just by thoroughly bathing, staying hydrated, eating lots of vegetables and using natural skin products, it also involves keeping the sheets we sleep on clean and nice enough for our skin to breathe.

Many at times, people sleep and wake up with skin irritations itching all over, and sometimes a red-like discolouration, which leaves them wondering why, even after making use of good products and following skin health tips. Researchers have discovered that most of these skin irritations are as a result of microscopic organisms that live within bed sheets and pillow sheets.

Here is how:

Dead Skin Cells
The human skin sheds over 500 million skin cells a day, and many fall off when we roll in bed. Each of these dead skin cells piles up in sheets and serve as feed for tiny dust mites in the air that settles on surfaces. This causes the tiny dust mites to grow and multiply which can trigger asthma, allergies and cause itchy eczema on the skin. The dust mites could also cause rashes on the skin to flare.

Body Sweat
The human skin naturally excretes 26 gallons of sweat in bed each year. The moisture at high humidity is an ideal fungal culture medium. Our skin pores have fungi and excrete excess oil when the hot air of the atmosphere causes our skin to sweat which drops on the bed sheets and pillowcases we sleep on. When this happens, the bacteria mixes with critters living within the sheets and serve as enhancers to their growth and breeding.

More so, our sweat droppings make our sheets moist which gives room for dust mites and critters living within our sheets to separate and clog to skin pores and block the pores from the air and excreting excess oil, which is ultimately unhealthy for the skin.

Saliva Droppings
The human saliva is made up of certain bacteria that are just fine within the system because they help to digest our food but on the outside. They are bad for our skin when found within our sheets.

Sometimes while fast asleep we tend to unconsciously drool, which settles on the sheets and mixes with other critters that feed off on dead skin cells. This makes the sheets totally uncomfortable for the skin which causes a person to scratch profusely, sometimes open wounds and bruises in the process.

The causes of unclean sheets cannot be avoided but the damage can be averted and avoided, by following these methods:

Wash Sheets In Hot Water
Washing our sheets in cold or lukewarm water just won’t do because it only slows down and restricts the growth and activities of bacteria and dust mites for a while. Hot water destroys them. This is because all agents and forms of bacteria cannot survive under a hot temperature above 140 F. As such, it is preferable to wash every bed sheets and pillowcases in hot water.

Change Sheets Once In A Week
Sheets are not to last for more than seven days on the bed because it gives room for bacteria to breed within. It takes just one dead skin cell to feed and multiply thousands of dust mites in a day and the human body sheds over 500 million dead skin cells in a day. Now imagine how many dust mites could be breeding in the sheets in seven days, definitely millions.

In case, a sick person occupies the bed, it is recommended to change the sheets three times a week and immediately change the sheets and clean up after recuperation.

Air Sheets Everyday
After each night spent in bed, dry out the sheets in the sun. The heat from the sun kills every form of bacteria and dust mites that could be breeding within the sheets. The sun also exfoliates the smell of body sweat and saliva, leaving the sheets clean and fresh like new.

Also, sheets can be aired just by shaking out and leaving it lay on the bed under the fan or air-conditioner. This also gives room for the sheets to be free of dust mites.

Our sheets are partners to our skin both clean state benefits the other, so keeping clean sheets help your skin feel better, healthy and glowing.