The Problem

My last couple kids have gotten really bad cradle cap.  This is what Livia’s head looked like even after she turned two:

It’s so scaly and gross. Blech.  But they have so. much. hair that I have a hard time really getting it scrubbed off well.  It’s hard to get up underneath the hair with anything.  I can use a fingernail and scrape some of it loose, but it takes a while, the kids hate it, and it’s hard to do a tiny one’s soft spot that way and still be confident I’m not going to hurt him.

Bean-b-Clean

The Bean-b-Clean is a brush designed especially for scrubbing baby scalps to remove cradle cap.  The bristles are made to be soft enough not to hurt, but stiff enough to do the job.

You can sort of see the bristles here.  Essentially, the main part of each bristle is semi-stiff, but the very ends are softer.  This way they don’t just “mush” when you try to scrub baby’s head (like if you used a standard baby hairbrush), but they don’t scratch (like if you used a regular comb).

My only concern was whether it would snarl Caleb’s hair.  (You’re supposed to scrub in a circular motion.  I had visions of my younger siblings twisting their hair around round brushes and didn’t want a similar thing happening with my infant!)

So I wrote to them and asked about this.  They assured me that this shouldn’t be a problem, and ended up making arrangements to send me one I could try out so I could tell you about it here.

Our Experience

So this is what Caleb’s head looked like before.  (I tried to get pictures of the top of his head, but…well, hair.  This part at the front of his hairline is the only part I was successful photographing.)

It’s a little more “scaly” looking farther back, but you can see where it has kind of a “waxy” thing going on here.  Unfortunately, the Bean-b-Clean still didn’t get through his hair.  It did not tangle the hair at all, so it was not a problem that we tried it.  And I think that he could have had this much hair and still had it be effective, but that his hair is simply too long.  The bristles weren’t long to make it all the way through the mat that was his hair.  (Seriously, this kid looks like he has a traditional little-boy side-parted hairstyle already, and he’s not 3 months old.  He has a lot of long hair!)

When we were done, we just had soggy cradle cap.

BUT…the brush does work.  After we did his regular bath, I tried pulling back the hair (like I did for these photos) and just scrubbing this area at the hairline.  The Bean-b-Clean did effectively loosen up the cradle cap here.

(Side note.  If your baby has a lot of hair like this, don’t try to use a thick oil-based treatment for cradle cap.  It doesn’t get down under the hair, either, and you just get icky hair.  See how the loosened flakes of cradle cap are now stuck in his hair?  I had to shampoo it three more times before it didn’t look totally gross.)

Conclusion

The brush is well-designed.  I would definitely recommend it if your baby has cradle cap and is bald.  And I think that if your baby has hair, but it’s short, it will work well for you, too.  Better still, it’s made right here in the U.S. (and the company is based in my home state of Virginia!) so you’re supporting a domestic company (and, for some of us, a local company) when you buy it.  🙂