Post by whatisacait on Nov 13, 2014 13:36:24 GMT -5
My 8.5 month old son has had eczema since this summer. It has progressed to be pretty bad, although mostly only in two small patches - his cheek and chest. He permanently has a sock on his hand but still manages to scratch until it bleeds, so we've been unable to get him past a certain point with its healing.
Long story short, since he was born at home and we have a very clean diet and use only natural/homemade products, it's hard to see any trigger except food sensitivities through my milk. EXCEPT that he had two days of antibiotics at two months old. We thought he had pertussis, so although I hate that it happened, I don't regret the decision either and am just thankful we got the results early (we thought it would be much longer, which is why we chose not to risk waiting for results) and he was only on antibiotics for two days. So this is definitely a factor.
He has only had a few solid foods himself and is still mostly exclusively breastfed. I waited awhile after 6 months and then he had bone broth for a few weeks. Now so far he has had winter squash, carrots, pear, bone broth, liver (can't get him to eat much of it!), lard, banana, and avocado. I introduced egg yolk, which I would not have done if I had thought about AIP yet, but I hadn't - so I wanted to give it to him as a good nutrient dense food. He's also had good quality probiotics since then, and I take them as well.
We are not officially a paleo family (yet?
but I had been gluten and dairy free for two months before starting AIP. His eczema seemed to clear up but never stayed away, and ultimately has not gotten better. It got the worst it's been after I started AIP, which I thought might be a detox reaction.
It has now been 3 and a half weeks of me being AIP, but I also chose to eliminate coconut and citrus, just because I was desperate to find out what might be a trigger for him, and figure it out all at once - it started out as doing a big elimination diet and I realized it was just a modified AIP. Citrus can be an irritant especially for babies, and since it's possible to be allergic to coconut I went with that as well. It's been hard!
What I'm struggling with is worry that I'm not seeing huge improvement yet (it seems to be improving but not enough to know it's the diet), as well as the fact that I didn't plan for this specifically, and we're having guests for Thanksgiving, traveling for Christmas, and so on. I realize there are people here who eat AIP for years or as a lifestyle, so I know that sounds whiny, but I have to be honest. I did not plan to make my whole visiting family have an altered holiday, nor can we really afford to feed guests paleo for a week. I hoped I'd see the eczema disappear in a few weeks and be able to start finding out what specifically triggered him. The rest of us do not have known health issues, so I'm curious how I'll feel reintroducing things!
I've read all I can online (including The Paleo Mom's eczema article) and can't find much specifically about nursing babies needing AIP. I want to find out what would be different for them, since they're not eating the food directly, although of course it affects them. Eczema seems common for babies, and many parents talk about how their child grew out of it. So I'm curious if eczema is always an autoimmune disease or if it is sometimes not explainable, particularly with babies, or something a baby will grow out of.
Would it be unwise to try adding coconut products or citrus back in before seeing real improvement, even though they are included on AIP, since I eliminated them to begin with? I would love advice from anyone else with experience with eczema or nursing babies needing healing.
Another note; I'm getting my wisdom teeth out on Tuesday, and although I am supposed to pump and dump for at least 24 hours, any thoughts on that being terrible for him? I'm saving up milk and will do my best to avoid strong painkillers but we'll see what happens!
Long story short, since he was born at home and we have a very clean diet and use only natural/homemade products, it's hard to see any trigger except food sensitivities through my milk. EXCEPT that he had two days of antibiotics at two months old. We thought he had pertussis, so although I hate that it happened, I don't regret the decision either and am just thankful we got the results early (we thought it would be much longer, which is why we chose not to risk waiting for results) and he was only on antibiotics for two days. So this is definitely a factor.
He has only had a few solid foods himself and is still mostly exclusively breastfed. I waited awhile after 6 months and then he had bone broth for a few weeks. Now so far he has had winter squash, carrots, pear, bone broth, liver (can't get him to eat much of it!), lard, banana, and avocado. I introduced egg yolk, which I would not have done if I had thought about AIP yet, but I hadn't - so I wanted to give it to him as a good nutrient dense food. He's also had good quality probiotics since then, and I take them as well.
We are not officially a paleo family (yet?
but I had been gluten and dairy free for two months before starting AIP. His eczema seemed to clear up but never stayed away, and ultimately has not gotten better. It got the worst it's been after I started AIP, which I thought might be a detox reaction. It has now been 3 and a half weeks of me being AIP, but I also chose to eliminate coconut and citrus, just because I was desperate to find out what might be a trigger for him, and figure it out all at once - it started out as doing a big elimination diet and I realized it was just a modified AIP. Citrus can be an irritant especially for babies, and since it's possible to be allergic to coconut I went with that as well. It's been hard!
What I'm struggling with is worry that I'm not seeing huge improvement yet (it seems to be improving but not enough to know it's the diet), as well as the fact that I didn't plan for this specifically, and we're having guests for Thanksgiving, traveling for Christmas, and so on. I realize there are people here who eat AIP for years or as a lifestyle, so I know that sounds whiny, but I have to be honest. I did not plan to make my whole visiting family have an altered holiday, nor can we really afford to feed guests paleo for a week. I hoped I'd see the eczema disappear in a few weeks and be able to start finding out what specifically triggered him. The rest of us do not have known health issues, so I'm curious how I'll feel reintroducing things!
I've read all I can online (including The Paleo Mom's eczema article) and can't find much specifically about nursing babies needing AIP. I want to find out what would be different for them, since they're not eating the food directly, although of course it affects them. Eczema seems common for babies, and many parents talk about how their child grew out of it. So I'm curious if eczema is always an autoimmune disease or if it is sometimes not explainable, particularly with babies, or something a baby will grow out of.
Would it be unwise to try adding coconut products or citrus back in before seeing real improvement, even though they are included on AIP, since I eliminated them to begin with? I would love advice from anyone else with experience with eczema or nursing babies needing healing.
Another note; I'm getting my wisdom teeth out on Tuesday, and although I am supposed to pump and dump for at least 24 hours, any thoughts on that being terrible for him? I'm saving up milk and will do my best to avoid strong painkillers but we'll see what happens!
