How to get blood out of a mattress

Cold water only, a bicarb paste, and peroxide with a hidden test for old marks. How to clean a mattress you cannot soak.

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Two facts shape everything here. Blood is protein, so warmth cooks it into fabric permanently, and a mattress is a sponge you cannot wring out, so anything you pour in stays in. Every step below is therefore cold and nearly dry: a wrung-out cloth, a paste, a dab of pharmacy peroxide for the stubborn stuff. It is slower than attacking the mark with a wet sponge, and it is the difference between a clean mattress and a stained one with a mould problem.

Takes about 30 minutes, plus a full day of drying.

What you need

Cold water, and only cold
White cloths
Bicarbonate of soda
Optional: 3% hydrogen peroxide from the pharmacy

The steps

Cold water, dabbed not poured. Wet a cloth with cold water, wring it well, and dab. Blood is protein, and anything warm cooks it into the fabric permanently. A mattress also must not get soaked, so the cloth stays wrung out.
Keep swapping cloth sections. Dab, check, move to a clean bit of cloth, dab again. Fresh blood can come out completely on this step alone.
Bicarb paste for what remains. Mix bicarbonate of soda with a little cold water into a paste, spread it on the mark, leave 30 minutes, then dab off with the wrung cold cloth and let it dry.
Peroxide, tested first, for old stains. On a stubborn or old mark: dab a drop of 3% hydrogen peroxide somewhere hidden on the mattress first and check it does not bleach the fabric. If safe, apply a small amount to the stain, let it fizz, dab away with cold water, repeat once if needed.
Dry it completely. Air the mattress with a window open or a fan on it for a day. A mattress that goes back under bedding damp grows mould, which is a worse problem than the stain.

What never to do

Warm or hot water at any stage
Soaking: a wet mattress core cannot dry
Peroxide without the hidden test
A hairdryer on the stain

And the rule that outranks every stain: never mix cleaning products. Bleach combined with ammonia, or with vinegar or other acids, releases toxic gas. One product at a time, rinsing between.

Set-in stains across a large area, or any mattress that has taken real liquid, respond better to professional extraction, which cleans with controlled moisture and pulls it back out the same minute.

When the stain wins

Professional upholstery cleaning works through controlled moisture and extraction, safe on fabrics that home methods would soak or ring. Sofas from £26 a seat, mattresses from £35.

See upholstery cleaning All stain guides