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I don't believe in antibacterial soap,wipes etc. but I do think that you should shower regularly. I don't know how anyone can go 3 weeks without showering and washing your hair. My children played outside and got dirty and sweaty no way to not bathe them.
My son has many food allergies. But I suspect those were from the massive amounts of antibiotics I was given for the c-section and the antibiotics I was on twice during pregnancy. When I read about the connection between antibiotics, being too sanitary, and allergies, we started to change things. He's never been on antibiotics himself though. I'm pregnant again and doing everything I can to avoid antibiotics and a c-section this time around.
Antibiotics don't cause food allergies....and you wouldn't have been given "massive doses" for a C section...just 1 dose immediately before....
WHile I believe that exposure to "dirt" keeps our immune systems on their toes, I would NOT go that long without bathing. Are your kids in school? Do the teachers or other kids complain about the stench? I'd worry more about my kids' social adjustments than not taking a bath!
Kids don't sweat; therefore, they don't stink. Of course rolling around in garbage or some such activity produces stink, but in general, kids don't stink, and they don't usually have scent perception, either, unless it's totally gross.
That's the reason you don't suffer a lot of colds. It's not your family germs that will be the problem, it will be the "strange" germs your children collect from the host of other children they encounter and bring home with them--and that is many more types of "strange" germs than they encounter even with your relatively fewer family friends.
Consider the surface of a desk or table--over the course of a day, that surface may have two dozen children snozzling their mucus onto it. And your children will bring that back home to you.
Once your oldest starts preK or kindergarten, your family will be treated to lots of viruses. You're just not at that stage of life yet.
That said, now my kids are teens and we were not sick at all in the past year. Everyone showers daily, but we don't buy antibacterial anything, and our house is not sanitized all the time. We are not rabid hand-washers. We do avoid antibiotics; my son hasn't had one in about six years (he had a bout of strep throat when he was 9 or 10; prior to that, he hadn't had antibiotics since he was a baby), and my daughter, who is 13, has never had one at all. We have pets and do things out of the house. My son travels frequently around the USA and is exposed to lots of different people, but has, for the most part, stopped bringing home random viruses.
It really depends on where you are in life. Kids do need to catch the colds and other mild illnesses that go around to keep their immune systems healthy, and you can't avoid them once they start spending days in a classroom with other children. We actually homeschool, but we still got all of our germs once the kids were in classes and camps. I'm sure your kids will also pick up various illnesses, regardless of whether they shower regularly.
Kids don't sweat; therefore, they don't stink. Of course rolling around in garbage or some such activity produces stink, but in general, kids don't stink, and they don't usually have scent perception, either, unless it's totally gross.
Kids do sweat. Their sweat just doesn't stink until puberty or perhaps a little younger.
I dislike baths and showers. I probably shower once every few weeks, and bathe my kids every few weeks too. It's been about 3 weeks since my last shower and my hair is starting to feel a little greasy so it might be time. If we get visibly dirty or sweaty, I'll rinse us off with plain water. We do wipe certain areas (armpits, butt, etc) every day with water and apply some coconut oil. We just got through the past several months without even a cold. I really can't remember the last time we were sick, it has to be over a year. I hardly wash my hands, except in a public restroom or after touching raw meat or getting crap on my hands.
I used to shower all the time, and be very strict about baths everyday for the kids and always use antibacterial and bleach everything. We got sick a lot more, and winter was basically one long cold. Now we just clean everything with water, maybe a little vinegar if I'm feeling extra clean. I do bleach the inside of the toilet or the counter/sink if there has been raw meat there..... and no sickness or colds to speak of.
Why, when we go against all modern notions of personal hygiene, have we not gotten some horrible illness or been sick at all? Is the whole shower/wash hands/antibacterial soap thing a total scam? I see my friends sanitizing their kids hands all the time, and they are always getting sick.
There is a happy medium between never bathing and sanitizing everything. I avoid antibacterial everything because it kills off too many beneficial bacteria and it also gives me a rash.
You and your kids are living an unhealthy lifestyle, and you will probably cause them to be ostracized. They'll be the "smelly kids".
People perspire in widely differing amounts. People also have wildly different senses of smell. I can smell so many things that others can't, while my DH has had several injuries to his nose and smells only the strongest smells, and usually only if I point them out. Otherwise he's fairly oblivious to smells. I don't know why I have an over-active sniffer, but it really can be a problem when I can smell people I am near or walk by in public, or if I'm near a restroom that's improperly vented. It's just so gross. When I enter someone's home I can usually tell if need to take the trash to the can, change their kitchen sponge, have a bad potato in the cupboard, or need to clean their litter box or bathe their dog all within the first minute or two in the home.
So that being said, OP may be a relatively low perspirer, or may have a spouse with a poor sniffer. People also become "nose-blind" to smells they are around frequently. I know that's a commercial on TV right now, but it's true. Some people can't tell that their house smells bad, or if they have BO, but strangers can!
I just can't imagine not bathing at least every other day, unless I'm on a backpack trip in the wilderness, or some third world country where there are no showers. Even then I would have to do a wash job on the "critical areas" daily. My hair will be plastered to my head with grease after 3-4 days without washing.
I think many of the elderly also lose their sense of smell as they age. Many also reduce their bathing frequency and this can really spiral out of hand. It's the root of all those jokes about "old man smell". I guess my point is that OP and family may think they are fine, but people are probably just being polite, when it would be kinder to let them know that bathing would help others' perceptions of them.
People don't need to be disinfected--things, however, often need to be disinfected. It's not your own germs that you've carried around with you all your life that are a problem--they actually form a "protective barrier" that's nearly as effective as your own skin. Skin or bacteria, they're all biological cells, after all, and when you skim off the harmless bacteria, you've removed a barrier to harmful bacteria.
But it's the things that you or your children touch outside your home that will carry harmful organisms from sick people into your bacteriologically harmonious environment.
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