Allergies & Eczema

Sam has had eczema all of his life but his skin became markedly worse around September of last year. Before that his eczema was difficult but manageable. Now, more often that not it is painful, inflamed, and out of control. He always has some kind of rash but it isn't always inflamed or noticeable to others. He also gets hives. The rashes vary in shape and color and intensity - sometimes it is light pink and barely there (others will say "Oh he looks so great!" but I know better) and other times it is angry red and very scary looking. He gets it the worst on his lower legs, lower arms,  and the tops of his feet, but quite often it covers him head to toe.

His pediatrician told me that this "eczema" is just dry skin, it is a skin condition and has nothing to do with diet or allergies. I am looking for a new pediatrician! I used to believe this and obediently continued refilling my prescriptions of topical steroids and slathering on various moisturizers to keep the rash at bay, but when your child has been on steroids and moisturizers for over a year with no improvements, you start to wonder about that method. Plus the changes I mentioned above - color, shape, intensity- were happening over a twenty-four hour period, and dry skin does not behave like that. Get real doc.

I noticed Sam would get red rings around his eyes and start to rub them a lot during or just following meal time. He would also get spotty around his neck and chest. By night time the rash would have covered his body would and remain for weeks. When I started opening my eyes to the clear association with food I suspected food allergies. Plus I read many forums online and testimonies from moms who were able to pinpoint food allergies their babies had, eliminate those, and see drastic improvements in their 'eczema'.

There have been two incidences when Sam ingested walnuts and I was able to watch him go from nearly clear to a red spotted dalmation in less than 20 minutes. One of these times I took him to the ER, but luckily his throat never closed up or anything. I have also been able to pinpoint a worsening rash following dairy consumption. But I suspect he has multiple food allergies because eliminating just nuts and dairy have not healed his skin. I have taken him to an allergist but he was never able to get the skin prick test because his back never cleared enough to do so. The allergist had me trying various methods to clear his skin from September to December, and we could never get there without huge amounts of meds. And the tests are not accurate with the meds in your system. There is a blood allergy test that is much more expensive, and for one reason or another we haven't been able to make that happen yet either. So I don't really have any definitive answers.

I am still working on it. We have tried various elimination diets. I am constantly experimenting with his diet. Sam is 20 months now, and I have nursed up until this point, so whenever I eliminated foods from his diet I had to eliminate them from mine too. But it is a huge challenge. I would be cooking one meal for me and Sam, and another for Adam, Georgia, and William. I am not very experienced in reading labels for allergies so while it was easy not to give Sam dairy, I never knew if I was somehow getting dairy protein into my milk supply from an overlooked milk-derived ingredient in a processed food I ate. I would eat a pancake or something thinking there's no dairy in there, then later realize it contained whey. It also contains egg and wheat, both things he might also be allergic too. It's just so stinking tricky.

I have decided we need to stop nursing and today was day #1. We are just going cold turkey. I am anxious to separate the stress of watching my own diet from the stress of watching his. Very soon I should have more control over what gets into his body. Maybe then we can make some progress in discovering all his allergies.

I've only photographed Sam's skin on a few occasions. I don't like to take pictures of him when he's all flared up. I prefer to take photos when his rash is softer and unnoticeable. As it is, his flare-ups usually occur at night and are most visible then. But taken at night with only dim lighting the camera still does not capture very accurately what his skin looks like. I had to increase the contrast on these photos to show the rash. So the color of these are a bit more dramatic than in reality, but not much. The emotions invoked by looking at these photos, at least for me, are the same as seeing this on my sweet boy in real life. I can't stand that I haven't been able to solve this for him yet. It is constantly on my mind.

These photos are from September 2011:

And, March 2012: