Infantile Eczema - May 2013

Mr. T on a good day. Looking generally much better.

Since the last blog entry I tried Hopes relief moisturiser as their dry skin treatment cream was so good. Silly me never read the ingredients, just assumed all was good. Poor Mr.T turned out in a red rash and got very itchy. I checked the ingredients and yup, Shea butter. Bummer. I'd tried Shea butter on him before and he got a reaction, which makes me believe he has a nut allergy too.  We promptly put him in a bath and washed him off and have now resorted back to Salcura Zeoderm for non broken skin and Hopes Relief dry skin rescue for broken skin.
The Zeoderm is nice and greasy but is sore for him if you put it on the open areas, whereas the Hopes Relief seems to give him some immediate relief.
We also discovered from a friend who is similarly allergic to things that the fact he was sleeping in a bed with feather duvets wasn't good. I had been cleaning the sheets at least once a week with either Dr. Bronners soap or  soapnuts and at the same time hoovering and steam cleaning the mattress but then we decided (to Toms dismay :) that we would switch to hollow fibre anti allergen duvet and pillows. We got them cheap enough from our local Heatons. We had hoped that maybe then we would get some sleep but no luck so far.

I have also made sure that Mr.T doesn't come in contact with any cuddly toys except for his two which we got as presents. They are made from organic materials, without chemicals, and have been super washed. 

All of us have ditched the usual hair products, conditioners, shampoos and also moisturisers and have detergent free soap, shampoo, and conditioner now. If I run out I've found bread soda works as shamoo aswell, and cider vinegar works well as conditioner. We now use organic coconut oil as a moisturiser for ourselves. I have found that now that Mr.T isn't exposed to detergents as much he starts getting irritated and itchy when a visitor holds him with 'normal washed' clothes and 'normal washed' hair and skin.

We have also discovered that the following foods are foods he needs to stay away from for the time being until his condition is more controlled:

- Oranges - any citrus
- Strawberries
- Tomatoes, peppers, potatoes - any nightshade family
- Soya
- and obviously the ones previousy discovered - dairy, goats milk,  eggs, fish.

At the moment he still has bottles of Neocate but he has about 2-3 solid meals a day consisting of dairy & egg free baby rice, and either apple or a mixture of sweet potato (not in nightshade family), carrot, kale, broccoli florets & leaves, cleavers, nettles and a pinch of oregano. He absolutely loves it. 

For ourselves, to try stay awake and with it, we trying to eat as healthy as we can as well as supplementing with complex B vitamins, zinc and magnesium as well as drinking my green smoothie and a mix of juiced garlic, ginger, honey and cider vinegar. Its hard to find the time to drink enough water in the day, but I try....

I have also realised that until we have reached a stage where Mr.T isn't going to break out all the time I have to limit trips away from home with him. On a normal trip somewhere the amount of detergent lint and allergens that surround him are insane. Even just being in the car aggravates his skin. I have tried pitting a car clean session into my weekly schedule but so far it has only happened once in the last 3 weeks. If we do go out somewhere, then we bathe him straight after and change our own clothes aswell.

I have some more things I have learned in the last few weeks in our quest against eczema but its getting late now and I'm on night duty so I will write a follow up on this post in the next few days. At least this way if anyone in the same predicament reads this they have some food for thought and ideas to try out. 

Thank you to everyone for reading and sharing this. I really appreciate it, and please, spread the word. We can only keep trying to combat this, and our little ones need our help. They need us to widen our perspectives past what doctors just diagnose as 'incurable infantile eczema'.

A little moment.....

I looked out the window tonight as the last daylight was fading and just stopped. I hadn't stopped like that in months. No one around me, nothing I had to do, just reality and I. I noticed things I hadn't had the time to notice over the last year; trees swaying, leaves green and vibrant, clouds moving, birds singing goodnight, a beautiful moon. 

Wow. It's like stress and being busy keeps you strong. Distraction and constant tasks build walls around you. It's a little scary how it all gets crumbly and starts falling away when you stop for a few minutes. It makes you weaker and the exhaustion seeps in. 

It's crazy though. How lucky am I? I walk past those trees everyday and mostly don't even acknowledge them. Yet they are amazing, we are lucky to live in a land so green and full of life and water. I feel very lucky. How did I get here? 5 years ago my life was very different, since then time has flown, and I haven't looked back. Whatever turn I took to get here in life, I'm bloody glad I took it! :)

From a childhood of turmoil and unease which I thought I couldn't break out of, to a life here in the beautiful remote countryside with an amazing family and amazing friends, a man like no other, and two children that have melted my heart. I feel like karma has given me a great big hug and said 'There you go. You deserve it. ' Well thank you. Thank you very much. The weight of my gratitude right now weighs even more than the weight of the hardship in finding my way here. 

We must not underestimate what we can achieve. The mind is an amazing tool of which we still know little about and our bodies are made of much more than we can comprehend. I'm glad I woke up a little just staring out the window. I'd hate to think life just passed me by. It's very short when you think about it. I appreciate everything and the people around me, and most of all I am thankful for the love and lessons my kids have taught me. There is no better way to learn true fear and unconditional love. 

Lets stop and listen to the wind in the trees every once in a while in our busy prioritised lives and think about the ones we love. Whatever the future holds, you have them - whether in spirit or in body. Shake off the disease that is negativity and take just one step at a time towards karma giving you a great big hug. :)

Green Breakfast smoothie

I've been asked a few times what I put into my breakfast smoothie, usually with a look of disgust on people's faces that see it. But wait till you taste it! It's good! And healthy, fills you up without being heavy too.  The main reason I do it is because I'm trying to get more raw leafy greens in my diet. 

So here goes: 

Ingredients:

 (excuse the 'rustic' style measurements, it's all about fun and personal preference so alter if you think you need to)

5 handfuls of fresh, washed spinach

2 handfuls of fresh chopped pineapple 

1 handful of blueberries

Half a litre of apple juice - not from concentrate!

Half a litre of GOOD water (not chlorinated, fluoridated tap water)

1 tbsp of organic hemp oil

1 tbsp of organic wheatgrass powder/or spirulina, whichevers handy. 

Blend it all up and voila! Pop eye? You can do better than that!

I'm not a nutritionist but I know the spinach has lots of iron. This can't be absorbed without vitamin C so hence the apple juice & pineapple.

The pineapple is in there as it makes it all taste yummy, and as well as the blueberries it is full of antioxidants. 

The hemp oil is for essential omegas, and the wheatgrass and spirulina may taste yuck, but are soooo good for you and go totally unnoticed with the pineapple in there. 

If there is no spinach then the leaves off our sprouting broccoli and kale are just as good. 

Enjoy! 

'Precious Play' ideas: Miss J's garden #2

What is going on with this weather? Crikey! It's not really like May is it? It's cold! At times I wonder if our little seedlings will be ok at night in 3-6 degree Celsius temperatures. Where will this climate change take our future food? .....

Miss J's garden corner was looking ready to sow a few weeks ago anyway so we decided to dig it. The seeds we'd sown previously in heated propagators didn't seem to take off so we opted for sowing the seeds directly instead. A little late, but everything was late in the garden this year as its just been so cold and wet. I think I'm going to put the heated propagators up for sale. They haven't produced anything strong ever. No idea why. 

All our seeds are heirloom organic seeds. What's the point in supporting giant food and seed companies selling hybrid seeds and having to crawl back to buy more GM seeds every year. I'd like the control to be in our hands, and I'd like homegrown organic non-sprayed veg grown from our own seed.  Miss J had the option to pick any seeds from the pile and decided she'd go for peas, carrots, and lettuce. Great! She loves eating peas and carrots, maybe this will get her eating lettuce! 

We dug over her garden, and 'groomed' it. ie. took out all weeds, lumps, stones (the big ones anyway) and sticks and added our own compost from last year. Then Miss J made 'semi' straight lines with the side of her hand, little trenches, and spread the seeds as evenly as she could before covering them  up gently. It didn't have to be perfect or symmetrical, what's the fun in that! ;)

Then off she went to find one of her 4 watering cans and filled it with river water and watered in her seeds. Voila! Very proud of my little girl. This time it's bound to work. I have much more faith in the polytunnel beds than in that propagator. 

....... That was about a month ago, and now?! Seedlings! Yippee! The carrots and peas are up, not quiet sure what happened to the lettuce, lol. Slugs or fairies maybe :)

Infantile Eczema

Apologies for the delay in writing my next post, but we have been totally rushed off our feet the last few weeks. As you will see below, we have undertaken a lot in the last month. 

The Paediatrician had said that all we can do is make Mr.T as comfortable as possible, and wait until he grows out of it, and use steroid creams and emollients until then. Well any doctor living with a baby with extreme eczema surely doesn't just leave it at that. It's impossible. You can't watch your little one suffer like that, and besides, the impact on family life, siblings and sanity is so immense, you just can't settle in for the ride. You have to do something, and keep trying.
We used the antibiotics as directed of course as his sores were weeping and infected. But once that was cleared, the advice the doctors gave stopped there. You are simply left to go home and deal with it. Although some of the things we have been doing may be classified as 'hippie', there is a lot of evidence to back up the fact that eczema is not just something that arises by chance. There is a reason for it, and there is a way to get rid of it. Environmental pollution is so great in industrialized western society, and it is here where most cases of eczema lie, and they are always increasing.

The emollient  ointment the doctor had prescribed us helped a little, but when the first tub was empty and we bought another, same brand, same ointment, all of a sudden our little man turned bright red like we had burned him with fire. The individual amounts of the ingredients must have somehow varied. He was screaming and shaking in pain. We had just lathered it on him like the previous tub, not thinking anymore of it. It was horrible. We bathed him and washed it off him straight away and resorted back to organic first cold press olive oil.

My brain wave came about four weeks ago, on yet another long night of restraining Mr. T. His itching and weeping sores had cleared up a little with the antibiotics, but then seemed to come back tenfold. 
He would feed every two hours at night, but whoever was on Mr. T duty wouldn't even get sleep in between as even in his sleep he would scratch himself. We had gloves and socks on his hands, but if you snoozed or fell asleep he'd take them off, and rip himself raw. One night I woke up to damp sheets as they had been soaked from his blood. I had only fallen asleep for 10 minutes. 
Another night Tom snoozed, and Mr. T took off his gloves and scratched his neck, see left. (I took quiet a few pictures of Mr.Ts ongoing struggles to give our homeopath a better idea of his condition ) It is an absolutely soul destroying, horrifying feeling to wake up to that and realise it is because you didn't prevent it. We now have Scratchsleeves which help more but the friction burn still mean you have to hold his hands. Of course we are getting increasingly sleep deprived as the months go on so the incidents of our concentration lapsing at night were also increasing. 

Then in the middle of the night I was online, trying to learn and research more, when I stumbled upon www.itchybaby.co.uk  I read every page of it twice and cried numerous times. It was like a wall of uncertainty and hopelessness crumbling away. Thank you Andrea! That website also brought me to www.solveeczema.org where I learnt more. Then I started making lists, we needed to change our way of living, and thinking.  After the site I really felt there was hope for Mr. T as the lady on the itchybaby site had a baby that sounded just like what Mr. T was going through. At night time there was no sleep, and his poor skin was irritated and sore everywhere except where his nappy was. His eczema was worse in areas where he sweated (elbows, knees, underarms) and where he kept scratching (calves, belly) and also on his cheeks. His left cheek was the worst all the time (perhaps from that side being closest to my clothes all the time as I am lefthanded).  Also, after bathtime he was better for a while. What is the likely cause for all this? DETERGENTS!

I hadn't realised just how bad detergents were, and that they are in just about everything from our clothes to our makeup to our food. I didn't even know exactly what a detergent was and the difference between it and soap. Please have a look at www.solveeczema.org and learn for yourselves. If you can't be bothered to read the site, her 45 min video is a good introduction but the site should really be read if you are problem solving. 
We need to learn to look at the ingredients in products. Its crazy what they sell us. The words 'Natural' and 'Hypoallergenic' are apparently not legally binding. Crazy! They can simply be put on packaging if the products marketing department sees it fit. 'Organic' products also don't escape the detergents....

So basically, since discovering these websites Tom and I have been taking action with the help of the family. We took everything out of the house, furniture and all. Everything was to be cleaned and washed again without detergent. I used vinegar, lemon juice, and non detergent soap to clean all furniture and surfaces. With the help of family and friends our living space was painted and varnished and scrubbed with low VOC materials. All furniture and belongings except soft furnishings and clothes were cleaned and moved back in. All clothes have to be superwashed. As in, I am washing everything at least three times with soapnuts ( www.soapnuts.co.uk  ) before I move it back into the cupboards, same with the curtains, couch covers etc. The residual detergents in these need to be eliminated to give Mr. T a chance, and it will take a few months but thats a start. Needless to say I am nowhere near finishing washing the clothes yet :) 
Mr. T is now only wearing organic cotton and his blankets, bibs, socks and hats are also only organic cotton. It costs a small fortune, but if needs be I am willing to be in debt, and right now needs be :) I have spent a lot of time online shopping around, and the cheapest, best organic cotton clothes and accesories I have found are listed below. Of course, local is better, hence I try the irish sites first, especially The Organic Cotton Shop in Clonakilty. 
There is some hype about the eczema clothes impregnated with colloidial silver, and we have some for Mr.T to sleep in. They do seem to calm him a little, but only by a little :) There has been no change in the overall incessant itching. I cannot speak for everyone though. Eczema seems to be that way. What works for one may not work for another.
We have also banished the cat and we're keeping a stricter cleaning routine in order to reduce more allergens. Garden dirt is healthy, cat hair and dust mite poo is not :)
We have also realised that washing Mr. T and his bottles and clothes in the hard mains water wasn't good. We are now using well water to bathe him, wash and fill his bottles, and to handwash his clothes. I handwash his clothes and bedding with just that water and bicarbonate soda and give them a good rinse. 
Every nappy change we also wash him down with Aalgo from the econatural site listed below. It is seaweed powder that you just mix with water. You can also make wraps with it but we havent just yet. We also put it into Mr. T's bathwater. 
He has also started eating solids so we are giving him organic homegrown potatoes, kale, broccolli, spring onion, carrot, nettles, cleavers and a sprig of herb robert and peppermint. The herbs are good for the lymphatic system, allergies, stomach upsets, and also astringent. We noticed Mr.T's lymph nodes swollen in his neck at times, which means his body is fighting something, hopefully not for much longer. 
Mr. T is still very ill now, odd days where he has weeping sores etc but I think these are due to chemicals, detergents, and allergens still being in the house. Some days he is clearer than he has ever been. The change in his skin overall has been amazing. His calves had red sores, these are now a faded pink and some parts actually feel like soft baby skin. His elbows and underarms are the same.  We are also only halfway through our detergent banishing mission. A lot of washing and cleaninng still has to be done. 
Night times seem to be more itchy than before, with unstoppable itching, meaning we have to block his arms and legs from his body to stop him scratching and wrestle with Mr.T to stop him hurting himself and don't get to sleep, but from email corrrespondence with A.J. from the www.solveeczema.org I am put at ease a little as she says the intermediate phase of banishing detergents is usually like that. The fact our washing maxhine is still connected to the hard water mains doesnt help as it takes longer for detergents  to wash out with such water but we will be connecting the whole house to well water soon.

One cream I would really like to recommmend for anyone with eczema is the Hope's Relief cream. You can find this in the shop at www.itchybaby.co.uk . Its all natural with homeopathic remedies in it, and works wonders instead of steroids. I have ordered their moisturiser in the hope it is equally as good.

I know there are many families out there dealing with eczema, asthma, and problem skin. Before our little man came along I didnt know much about this, but in an effort to combat his suffering we have learnt these things. I am sharing them with you as the trial and error of it all is expensive, and it is so amazing to find someone who is able to support and help. Families in this situation need to keep hoping and trying. Desperation, anger, exhaustion and stress will take over your lives, but remember that our little angels have to go through so much more, and we as the person they trust and love need to keep strong and focused. Having a supportive spouse or family is key. 

The information I am giving to you now in this post has been collected both from the sites I mention as well as other online sources. I thank both Andrea and A.J. for their research and time they have taken in  gathering this information and putting it out there and also their email correspondence and support. There are so many parents in the same situation as us and don't know what to do. 

By no means am I saying any of this information can be used as an alternative to visiting a doctor if your baby is sick. I am merely taking you with me on our own journey if you are interested, and am hoping people in the same situation find a little support and advice. If anyone wants to contact me simply comment below, I understand this is a difficult situation and one can feel very lost and desperate.

Thank you to anyone that reads this, I'm sure banishing detergents will benefit everyone (except for its manufacturers) and if some babies and kids out there can find at least some relief it would be amazing.
Please spread the word! 

Our beautiful Mr. T on a good day after his solids :)

Online shops for organic baby clothes & non detergent products:

http://www.organiccottonshop.ie/
http://www.econatural.ie/
http://www.earthmother.ie/
http://www.terrynappies.co.uk/index.php
http://www.welovefrugi.com/
http://www.everythingforeczema.com/
http://www.ecomama.co.uk/
http://www.johnlewis.com

Precious Play Ideas: Mummy & Miss J days

Seeing as time between Miss J and myself is rather limited at the moment we have come up with an idea - Mummy & Missy days!

A special day that we’ll do regularly, once or twice a month say, where Mummy and Miss J just go on an outing all day long, and it’ll just be the two of us. Like the old days. 

Miss J was ecstatic about the idea. We used to be like two peas in a pod, like best friends, but understandibly the last few months have been rather focused on Mr. T so I think we have some catching up to do. 

We decided to sit down and ‘draw’ up a list of things she enjoyed doing, and wanted to do on a Mummy & Missy day. Seeing as a list would be rather boring for a three  year old we made a ‘drawing list’. As you can see, most of the things she enjoys doing are on it: 

Horse riding, Indoor Activity Centre, Playground, Shopping, Swimming, Going to a friends house, Forest nature walk, A trip to the beach. 

Then, when the day comes she can pick any two of those things, and off we go. Looking forward to it! Can’t wait! 

Once Mr. T is old enough I can have Mummy & Mr days too. Camping, Motocross etc, whatever he's into, I can't wait :)