Jacob, my oldest, was a very healthy baby....at first. He was 9 pounds and 1 ounce when he was born. I was able to breastfeed him until he was 6 months. I am a full time teacher and I just couldn't pump enough to keep up with how much he ate. So at 6 months I put him on formula. At first we didn't have any issues, but it wasn't very long until I noticed he had a lot more dirty diapers then when he was breastfed. He was having 6-8 runny diapers a day! That is a lot! Not only that, he was getting the worst diaper rash that just wouldn't go away. I took him to the doctor and told him my concerns but no one listened. I even tried him on Soy formula and it seemed to help; however, his doctor said he didn't need soy and to put him back on regular formula. Against, my "mommy gut" I did what I was told. He was the doctor, so he knew better right? What did I know as a first time mom? Jacob continued to get worse. Between 0-6 months he rarely was sick. Maybe the occasional ear infection but that was about it. Between 6-12 months he had pneumonia, RSV, extreme diaper rashes, bronchitis twice, tonsillitis, several stomach viruses, tonsillitis, multiple ear infections, and other minor illnesses. Oh and don't forget the 6-8 runny diapers a day! Each time we would go to the doctor I would mention milk being an issue and was told it wasn't and to keep giving him the milk based formula. I would also mention the excessive dirty diapers and how he wasn't gaining as much weight. I was just told it was because babies slow down with weight gain as they get older. While I feel this is probably true, let me give you his stats. At 4 months he was 16 pounds. At 1 year he was 20 pounds. He gained 4 pounds in 8 months. I understand that there are some babies that don't gain very much and are smaller in stature. My youngest, who I affectionately call my "little peanut" is one of these kids. He has always been on the smaller side and just doesn't eat a ton. He's just a little fella. However, this was not the case with Jacob. He was eating a ton and not gaining like he should. You are going to think I am exaggerating when I say this but I promise you I am not. He would eat 6- 8oz bottles a day, plus a full breakfast, full lunch, full dinner, and several snacks during the day. Yet he only gained 4 pounds in 8 months. Even when he was sick he still ate this amount of food. Nothing ever seemed to slow him down. I brought up the concerns over and over again to the doctor but he was meeting milestones, several of them earlier then most kids, and he didn't seem concern. I finally listened to my "mommy gut" and insisted that milk was giving him issues so I took him off all milk products at 12 months. That's when a lot of issues went away. From 12- 18 months we were healthy!
So I thought...
At 18 months I decided to try milk with him and he seemed to tolerate it pretty well. We started to let him have more dairy and everything seemed to be going well. Then his eczema started getting more severe. Oh I forgot to tell you, he started with eczema issues at 12 months. I knew nothing about eczema at the time and just thought it was dry skin. I had no idea at the time there was a deeper reason why he had eczema. So like I said before, his eczema started to get worse around 18 months. I took him to the doctor, and the doctor told us to get some Ceravae and he should be ok. He wouldn't even acknowledge it was eczema and just said it was dry skin but I knew better. After a few more months his eczema started to create open sores. We would take him to the doctor and the doctor would say to put Ceravae on it again. It took him a full year to acknowledge he had eczema. I would ask about food allergies and mentioned his sensitivity to milk as a baby and maybe a food allergy was causing his eczema. I was never taken seriously. When he was a little over 3 we finally were able to get an allergy test done. When we went in I was convinced we would find a food allergy. The test came back negative! NEGATIVE!!! I was in shock and disbelief. How could that be? I just knew the test would reveal something. At this point I felt defeated so we went home and did our own research. We came across an article that said that a lot of kids will have an allergy to the casein found in milk; however, it wouldn't show up in an allergy prick test. It is only detected through blood tests. I knew that had to be the issue. I asked if we could get an allergy blood test and we were told no by 3 different doctors. We finally decided that the doctors wouldn't help us so we had to figure it out for ourselves. We kept him off of milk for a while but didn't really see any improvement so we thought maybe we were wrong. We kept researching and praying for something. That's when a friend of ours told us about a doctor that actually tried to treat eczema with out steroids and lots of creams. He actually tried to get to the root of the problem. She talked to us about what he told them to do so we decided to try it out. Basically it was a paleo diet with lots of probiotics. We also use coconut oil as a topical cream instead of lotions. He explained to them that a lot of illnesses, eczema included, is an overgrowth of candida. It is a yeast that feeds on gluten, sugars,and several other things.
You can find several websites on the internet about candida and eczema. Here is a link that briefly explains it. http://www.naturalnews.com/035526_eczema_causes_skin.html However, you can find even more detailed information just by googling Candida and Eczema.
With Jacob we did it for 8 weeks and we saw lots of improvements! His skin was clear for the first time in 3 years! We thought we were in the clear and as we understood it, could go back to a normal diet but to just be cautious about too much sugar or other processed foods. The holidays hit and we got a little too relaxed about the diet but his eczema still looked great. After 3 month, I guess his body said enough was enough and it came back with a vengeance! We thought that this diet should have only been temporary. It's not like we were giving him donuts and soda for breakfast. We still were being careful but did allow a few treats here and there. It shouldn't have come back like it did. Below is a picture of what Jacob's skin typically looks like, besides that brief 3 months where he actually had clear skin.
After Bath
I told my husband there has to be something more. This is NOT normal!! We tried everything. Every kind of lotions, bleach baths, diet, etc. You named it we tried it. He had staph infection 3 times in 3 months because dirt would get inside the wounds and cause it to get infected. This is even with our attempts to keep it as clean as possible at all times. David, my husband said it was just the candida and I agreed with him 100% but there was something even deeper going on. Something causing the candida to be out of control. I called a different allergist and again requested a blood allergy test. I was convinced they were missing something but they refused to do the allergy test. I later found out it's because insurance doesn't cover it because it was too costly. If I would have known that from the beginning I would have told them I would pay cash! I don't care what it cost. There has to be something to help him out. My biggest fear was the staph would get into his bloodstream and cause an even bigger issue. I needed answers and I was desperate. That is all for now. But I will say that we have found someone who is willing to help us. Until next time, God Bless!!!
