Managing Eczema in our Baby Boy

What started out as cradle cap (a oily, yellow, scaly patches on the skin of the scalp which many infants experience) gradually turned into months of trying to manage eczema in our young boy. Like most new mothers when you are faced with any sign of change you want to know if its normal or not. When Charlie was only a few months old he had cradle cap, I did my research online and talked to several mothers and saw the Dr about it. I followed the treatment/management plan by using olive oil (I chose to use this as it was the most natural option). After weeks of treating it, the cradle cap didn't seem to get rid of itself, instead it seemed like it was moving more towards his forehead. There is a family history of eczema in my family, with my father and brother having it pretty seriously throughout their whole life. 

cradle cap and early signs of eczema at 3 months

We later made a family road trip to Melbourne. It was in September so the weather was rather cold and dry, we were in Melbourne for 1 week and a few days into it his 'cradle cap' (what I thought it was) had became very red, sore and pussy. It had never been so bad so I stopped using any oils on it as the skin was broken and I didn't want to irritate it any further. I didn't think too much of it except that perhaps the weather in Melbourne was so much cooler and drier to what we were used to andit was just his skin's way in reacting to the changing atmosphere. 

  

When we returned back to Sydney the following day I had an appointment at the Children's Hospital Westmead for Charlie to be a subject for the medical students paediatrics practical exams. When I arrived at the hospital I asked the organiser if there was someone who could look at Charlie's skin and immediately I had 3 paediatricians attend to him. Instantly they identified him to have a staph infection and had to withdraw him from the study as it was highly contagious. One of the doctors got straight onto his mobile and called the immunology & allergy specialist and asked if he had time to see Charlie. So in no more than 10 mins they got me to his office, wrote me a referral letter and had Charlie seen by the specialist. 

 3.5 month old with a nasty staph infection- but isn't this still a gorgeous photo, so peacefully asleep the butterfly landed on his mitten-covered hand. 

He was diagnosed to have a staph infection so the Dr gave him antibiotics to take and also cortisone cream for is skin. While the Dr was seeing Charlie he also did an allergy skin prick test on him and this is when we discovered he had a wheat allergy. But because Charlie was so young the test was not conclusive and he would have to be re-tested when he was older. A week later we saw the Dr again and the infection had cleared miraculously overnight and what he had left was redness around his face which presented as eczema. Our next plan of action to help improve or eliminate his eczema was to change my diet (I was still fully breastfeeding him so anything I ate he would be getting exposed to via the breast milk). The Dr put me on a no milk, eggs and nut diet to see if that would improve his skin. After a month I didn't really see any significant improvement in his skin so the Dr asked me to try putting him on Karicare Gold Pepti Junior formula, which would eliminate all types of foods that could be allergenic. After 2 weeks of formula there still was no show of improvement, so all we could really do was keep applying the creams the Dr had prescribed. So when there wasn't much we could do for the eczema we tried to prevent him from wounding himself with scratching. My mother-in law stitched up the hand holes of larger cotton shirts for him to wear so that he wouldn't scratch and bleed his skin. 

well into his eczema at 5 month old

eczema on his face at 6 month old- see the shirt with the hand holes sewn up

still a happy & playful baby at 6.5 months

It was difficult to see his skin so irritated and not be able to do anything to help relieve his pain. But once the weather was warmer we took him swimming at the beach. Swimming at the beach has always worked good for my dad and his eczema so we thought why not, we've got nothing to loose. After one swim in the beach his skin would look very tender but by the next morning most of the redness was gone. We went to the beach almost every day and on the days when we couldn't go I would bathe him in sea salt (from the health food shop). The salt water was amazing, not only did it help heal the wounds, his skin didn't seem as irritated and the roughness of the eczema had gone and his skin was soft and smooth and I hardly had to use the creams. 

massive improvements after a few swims at the beach

8.5 months old- thank you beach!

cheery 12 month old without eczema

So almost 15 months old he has not had another outbreak of eczema this winter and only occasionally will I need to use sorbolene just to keep his legs moisturised. I really hope he has grown out of the eczema. Maybe he'll break the chain of eczema in our family history. 

14.5 month old, survived through winter without any break-outs! 

If anyone has had any experiences with eczema in their children or for themselves, please feel free to comment, I would love to hear about your experience and learn from it.