Can My Child’s Complexion Change From Dark To How Fair He Was At Birth

We understand how Asians are particularly obsessed with their baby’s complexion. Especially when it’s a girl child, they expect her to be very fair. They are willing to take any concoctions prescribed by their old grannies during pregnancy, to have a fair-looking child. But if your fair-looking child gains a darker complexion a few weeks after birth, you begin to wonder what you could do to bring him back to his ‘original’ shade. Here’s what you need to know about your baby’s complexion:

1. Fairness or darkness is determined by one’s genes. One can do nothing about changing the complexion of a child. At the time of birth, your baby might be almost purple in colour because of an immature circulatory system that is still taking time to circulate the necessary oxygen through the body. Once oxygen begins to circulate, the bluish tinge would disappear and your newborn’s skin would range from red to pink. You are most likely to see this change towards the end of the first day after birth of your baby.

2. The complexion of your child would also be influenced by the environment around. At times, these influences are also temporary. In such instances, the skin color will return to normal shade that your child was born with.

3. The pregnancy weeks that your baby remained in gestation may also determine the skin color of your newborn. While in the womb, the fetus is most likely to develop its complexion in its sixth gestational month (Birth and Birthgivers: The Power Behind the Shame).

4. Most babies are born with light or pinkish skin. The pinkish tinge comes due to the blood vessels which are almost visible through the thin skin of babies. Since this is the skin color that parents see at first, they assume that it is the original color of the baby and begin to worry when it begins to darken. The transition from purple to pink happens as the blood vessels are more visible through your newborn’s very thin skin.

5. If you see a yellowish tinge in your newborn, it’s most likely due to physiological jaundice which is common in newborns.

6. Natural pigment called melanin determines the complexion of your child. The more the melanin content, the darker is your baby. Evolutionary biology believes that humans who were closer to the equator had more melanin, therefore they were darker in colour. Those who were farther from the equator had less pigment and therefore they had fairer skin.The genes that control the melanin in one’s skin function under the principle of incomplete dominance, which means that the variant gene traits are fully expressed so the child would carry the skin tone of both its parents.

7. Your baby’s true skin color develops in the first six months and continues well into his first year of birth and after that. It is purely controlled by the genes and you can do little to change that at all.

8. Also, with exposure to the sun, your newborn will have an altered complexion.

9. At times the darkness of the skin might also be associated with inadequate diet. So, while meeting the optimum feeding times might help restore a neat complexion, your baby will not necessarily get back to the hue it had at the time of birth.

10. Exposing your baby to cold can impart a bluish tinge while high temperature can impart a reddish tinge to the skin. At times your baby might have a red or purple hue due to intense crying. This is purely a physiological change and is temporary.

11. A predominantly visible blue tinge in the baby might occur due to problems associated with poor blood circulation.

12. Application of fairness creams on babies would not help them. Fairness creams contain steroids that are harsh on your baby and thereby might catch allergy or rashes. Trying to apply home-made remedial pastes might also lead to scratches or rashes in the summer heat. Talcum powder never changes one’s complexion, so its application in children does them no good. Moreover, talcum powder can lead to respiratory problems in babies. So, trying to apply anything on your child in the belief that it can change your baby’s complexion goes in vain.

Parents should be willing to accept their babies the way they are. It is futile to fuss over complexion in an age when color is no longer the criterion to judge a person. It’s time parents take pride in whatever color their child is.

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