Eczema Sucks!

I don't write a ton about Em's eczema on my blog because it's way more fun to write about the good things, but there's several things I want to write down so I remember for the future.  Because even though we've gotten over this hurdle, I know eczema is a constant battle.

Up until August of this year, Em's eczema has been kept under control for the most part.  She would have flareups here and there (mainly on her hands and feet), but nothing we couldn't take care of within a few days.  Starting in August, Emily was diagnosed with strep.  Along with it, like any infection, her eczema flared up.  Usually as the antibiotics are working to fight the infection,  the eczema usually gets better.  But this time, that wasn't the case.  It just seemed to be getting worse and worse and showing up in places she'd never had it before.  Poor Em just couldn't catch a break, as soon as the strep would go away, it would be back.  With each new infection, the eczema just kept getting worse and worse.  I feel like we were at the pediatrician weekly for months.  Since her eczema was so bad and she was itching constantly she kept developing staph infections on her skin as well.  So that was a whole other beast we had to fight.  The dr. gave her an antibiotic to try to fight the strep and the staph and that caused an allergic reaction.  By then her skin had just had enough and no matter what we tried, it just kept getting worse.  For about a week, she was covered head to toe in a raised, itchy, red rash.  Our pediatrician had no idea what was causing it. . the strep, the antibiotic, the eczema?  It was beyond frustrating to me!!  All I wanted to do was help my child and yet if the dr. didn't know the cause, how the heck was I supposed to know.  I literally felt helpless.  By now, Emily had missed so many days of school because of strep and then allergic reactions.  I spent so much time on the internet trying to find new things to try to help her.  Nothing seemed to work for her.  Every morning and night I was spending around 15 minutes slathering on lotions and creams to help her skin stop being so itchy and dry.

Shawn and I decided we'd had enough and started making other dr. appts.  We made an appt at the ENT and got her scheduled to get her tonsils out.  We also took her to the allergist to get her tested for all environmental allergens and retested for some foods.  That was a whole other battle.  We tried taking her off allergy meds for a week in order to do skin testing, but 3 days in, I called the dr. and said she can't make it.  Emily doesn't have normal allergies in the sense that her nose runs and her sinuses get stopped up, instead the allergens cause her eczema to flare.  She was covered in eczema and itching like crazy.  So we decided to do blood testing instead so she could go back on her allergy meds.  We got the results back and our poor girl is basically allergic to TX.  She's off the charts allergic to pretty much every outdoor allergen.  The allergy dr. told us to increase her morning allergy meds and gave her a prescription for night time meds.  He also gave us several new steroid creams for her skin and told us to do bleach baths and wet wraps each day.  The bleach baths help kill the bad bacteria and elminate the staph infections (which just looks like really bad eczema that won't go away). 

I started all the new meds, creams, bleach baths and wet wraps right away.  And all I can say, is what a HUGE difference it all made!  The bleach baths and wet wraps made the most significant difference.  She would sit in a bleach bath for 10 minutes and then we cover her in steroid cream, put her in wet jammies with dry jammies over them and she would sit for 2 hours.  Then we'd take the wet jammies off and cover her in moisturizer.  It was literally the only way to get moisture back into her skin.  We're still trying to decide if anything can be done in the future to help with her allergies.  For people with normal allergies, allergy shots are usually a good solution.  However, for a patient with eczema these shots can just make it a whole lot worse.  

We also made an appt with her dermatologist.   Her face was still flaring up and I wasn't quite sure what I could use on it (because regular moisturizer stung it since it was so dry).  Luckily, the dermatologist was able to give her a steroid cream that was safe enough for her face. 

I feel like after several very long, stressful months, we are finally seeing a light at the end of the tunnel.  She still has days where it flares up, but for the most part it looks night and day better!  I'm still giving her maintenance bleach baths, but not nearly as often as before. 

Before Em, I used to just think eczema was dry skin.  It's not even close to just dry skin. I had no idea how awful this condition could be!  As the allergy dr. said, until you have this yourself, you have no idea what it feels like.  Imagine sitting on an ant pile and getting bit all over.  You're body is so itchy that you itch, only itching just makes you feel more itchy.  And so the constant cycle starts.  Most people grow out of it, but considering Em has had this since she was an infant and it's not getting any better, her dr's seem to think this is something Em will have to deal with her whole life. 

Throughout the whole ordeal, I had been taking pics of her skin.  These are some of the worst days!

Waiting at the dr's office.  She is covered head to toe with red bumps.  She even had them all over her face.

Her face and neck had never been an issue before now!  She had constant red circles around her eyes.  Nothing helped them.

The eye infection that led to us having to cancel her birthday party.