PSA - Nose Suckage

It's been a about a year and a half since I felt I had a valid public service announcement to make...but this one is an important one to anyone who has a baby!  Are you ready?  It's all about using a nose sucker to get those boogs out!  What's snot to love about this turkey baster?

Ahem, excuse me, it does have a formal name: a bulb aspirator.  It was a proud moment when Jordan was in his big brother class and the nurse held one up and asked the kids if they knew what it was called and he proudly exclaimed that it's a nose sucker.  That's what we call it!  

For Chad, getting to use this thing is therapy.  He loves the sound and the feeling of clearing out those nostrils. Weird, maybe, but when you're kiddo is sick and can't blow his or her nose it's important.  Babies breathe primarily through their noses.  

Okay, so our most recent stint in the emergency room/hospital with Danner gave us a nose sucker refresher course and I'm here to share our expertise with you.  We are pros now at nose suckage.

In preparation of nose suckage you will need: a bulb aspirator AKA The Nose Sucker (we brought one home from the hospital when both kiddos were born and now that we were back in the hospital again...I've heard multiple people claim the ones from the hospital are the best but you can buy them in stores also), some kind of tissue, and saline.

Step 1: Lay baby down on his or her back.

Step 2: Put the babies arms over his or her head and hold them down.  This prevents the babe from jerking his or her head from side to side to avoid nose suckage.  Tip: If you have to do this alone (like I did today...) you can use one arm to pin his or her arms down and the other arm to suck the boogs.

FYI: This will likely cause some (or a lot) of unhappiness from the baby, but it's worth it to get that nose cleaned out.

Step 3: Spray saline into each nostril.

Step 4: Squeeze the nose sucker.

Step 5: Place the nose sucker into one nostril and let the ball part open up.  This will suck those boogs out.

Step 6. Squeeze the boogs out onto the tissue you have.

Step 7: Repeat steps 4-6 with other nostril.

Step 8: Release babies arms and quickly gather him or her up in yours and kiss, hug, squeeze, rock, soothe baby.

Phew!  I feel so much better now that I got that out there.  Seriously, all anyone even told us was to make sure to squeeze the ball part before you stick it in the nose otherwise your forcing boogs further in and that's no good.  I'm sure this isn't the only way to get boogs out but so far it's the most effective I've seen.  Do you use the nose sucker?  Do you have a good system for nose suckage you would like to share?  What do you affectionately (or maybe disgustedly) call you nose sucker?