Woman comes under fire for admitting she changes her bed linen every three to four weeks

You're probably not washing yours as often as you should

(Getty Images)

Snuggling into fresh bedlinen at the end of a long day is one of life’s greatest little pleasures.

But despite how enjoyable it is, changing your bed linen is a bit of a faff, and you may suspect you don’t do yours as often as you should.

And one woman has just come under fire for admitting she changes her sheets every three or four weeks.

Karen Aldridge, from Birmingham, was filmed for This Morning when she invited the show’s consumer expert Alice Beer into her house.

But when Rentokil hygiene expert Luke Rutterford came in, both women were shocked by his findings - using a special vacuum, Rutterford sucked out all the dirt from the mattress, presenting it to Aldridge as a bowl of brown, murky liquid.

“That is just shocking, absolutely shocking. I can't believe how much dirt was in there,” Aldridge said.

Rutterford explained that the mattress was full of skin cells, sweat and dust mites.

But perhaps what most got people talking was Aldridge’s admission of how often she changes her bed sheets: “I would leave it three weeks, maybe four when things are hectic,” she said.

Many were shocked.

In 2014, a YouGov poll found that 35 per cent of Brits wash their bed linen once a fortnight. But with humans shedding half an ounce of skin every week - largely in bed - even that’s not often enough.

Experts say we should be changing our bed linen every week to tackle dust mites and bacteria.

According to Beer, the dirt in the mattress was nothing to ashamed of though, as it’s largely unavoidable.

Rutterford does advise, however, that people vacuum their mattresses regularly, air them out by opening the windows, and washing sheets on a high temperature in order to kill any bed bugs.