When you have children, your first instinct is to protect them from anything harmful. You bring them home from hospital and feel utterly overwhelmed by the responsibility of having a little person completely dependent on you. You realize that it’s solely down to you to feed them, clothe them and keep them warm, dry, clean and safe at all times.
You lie awake at night, listening to them breathing and jumping at every little noise they make. When they’re newborn, you make sure they have a tightly fitting, breathable mattress, cellular blankets that won’t suffocate them and when they’re a little older, a special sleeping bag designed to keep them at just the right temperature so they don’t get cold from kicking off covers.
When they turn one they are old enough to have a duvet… and then you worry they might be allergic to the filling. One way to combat this is by getting a feather duvet. Dust mites are the most common cause of allergies and bedding is a popular place for them to thrive. Whilst washing bedding at high temperatures helps to kill the mites, duvets made of natural materials rather than synthetics can help to tackle allergies as feathers have been tested and proven to actually create an effective dust mite barrier.
In addition to this, in order to prevent the feathers from escaping or moving around and becoming unevenly distributed, the cotton covers tend to be woven more tightly and have a very small pore size, thus preventing dust mites from getting inside.
Natural fillings are also more breathable and absorb body moisture more effectively than synthetic materials due to the thousands of tiny air pockets. Although people may think they are allergic to feathers, it may just be that they are actually allergic to the dust and dirt that has collected inside the duvet.
By investing in a top-quality natural duvet you could at least be combating those allergens that lurk in the bedroom, because no matter how much you wrap up your children when they go out, keep your house at the recommended temperature and carefully monitor hygiene, they’ll still always manage to catch coughs and colds.
You want to protect them from every germ and know that you can’t. Sterilizing bottles religiously until they’re a year old won’t stop them from putting everything they can find on the floor in their mouths. Weaning them by the book won’t necessarily prevent them from having an allergic reaction to dairy, wheat or nuts.
You buy perfume-free wipes, ‘natural’ bubble baths and non-biological detergent so it doesn’t irritate your sensitive skin, yet rashes will still materialize from some unidentified source. At least by buying a duvet with a natural filling, you could have one less thing to worry about!
Charlotte Brown is a freelance blogger who usually writes about the humorous side of family life. Charlotte made the switch to a feather duvet several months ago when her young daughter refused to sleep in her own bed!