My husband and I have been blessed with four beautiful children all of which are healthy. My two redheads had some eczema in the creases and folds of their arms and legs during their first few years of life. Hydrocortisone seemed to really help this skin disease and it never affected them too much other than the occasional scratching here and there. Their small skin condition was more of an annoyance than anything else.
I had no idea what eczema really was. For those of you mommas out there who have a child with severe eczema, you know what I mean. There are some children who have a very mild cases of eczema. Maybe in the result of a minor patch of dry skin. My son developed severe eczema, I'm talking eczema from head to toe. He would scratch so much that he would bleed during the night and have gashes on his wrists and ankles. It was bad.
Now thinking back on his infant year, he would throw up his milk often but not often enough to lose weight. The first sighting of eczema with him was around 6 months old. I had no idea what we were dealing with. I even decided to take him to the ER because the Hydrocortisone was not doing the job and I wanted to be sure it wasn't something else. I was very frustrated when the doctor asked me if I had ever Googled it. Really? No, why would I Google a severe problem that my child was having before sending him off to the ER? That actually makes sense! (Can you feel the sarcasm in that statement.) I was angry, but while in the ER the nurse did make an appointment with our family doctor concerning this issue. The nurse was awesome and very helpful suggesting oatmeal baths and other solutions since her daughter also had eczema.
After our doctor appointment the next day I felt a little better. The doctor recommended using hydrocortisone with Vaseline daily and using the Dove gentle bar soap. She also gave me some Eucerine eczema cream to try. For a couple months it worked, kind of, his eczema was always there. It never cleared up like the minor cases I had seen in my older children. The very worst part was that it was also on his face. People would talk to me like I was a terrible parent because my son was disgusting and had this terrible rash. Everywhere we would go people would ask and talk about it. Not just friends and family but COMPLETE strangers!! I can not believe the nerve of people. Maybe they were trying to show concern but that's not how I processed it. Best advice from a mom to a curious person, just leave us alone we don't want to hear or answer the same question every time we go out in public. The truth is we may just snap on you because quite frankly we have children and our patience levels have already been used up for the day. I felt terrible for my little guy and everyone's comments made me feel even more terrible.
He was clearly uncomfortable and there was nothing I could do. I tried oatmeal baths, different creams and changing his soaps. Anything and everything within reason that I could find on Google or the suggestions from the doctor. The eczema cream and hydrocortisone was no longer working. Which made no sense to me because it had almost cleared up his skin before. Why doesn't it still work? Milo and I would both drown in tears. There were several late nights when he'd be up scratching his skin raw and just screaming. I felt helpless and completely exhausted.
TO BE CONTINUED....
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