Guest Post: Eczema

Here's a guest post from a sweet friend that we've met.  Her daughter is friends with Curly and has been diagnosed with multiple allergies.  She also has bad eczema just like Bee.  It's nice to get with other allergy moms, compare notes, encourage one another, and share frustrations.  You can learn more about their family at her blog: School Room of Life

Update on Erica

I haven't blogged a whole lot about Erica and her allergies and eczema and there's a lot of reasons for that.  I will one day blog about her history and the journey we've had up until now, but every time I try to write it all down, I get overwhelmed.  So I'll just start from last year.

In the spring of 2012, we discovered Erica had several food allergies:  peanuts, corn, soy, peas, and oranges.  After removing these things from her diet, her chronic stomach pain went away.  She started to FEEL good again.  And sure enough, anytime she ate something with one of her allergens in it, she'd feel HORRIBLE.  It was great to see such a huge improvement.  However, we saw absolutely no improvement in her eczema.  After switching between this steroid and that for her skin, the allergist finally agreed to try Immunotherapy (allergy injections) with her, as she also tested positive to MANY environmental allergens:  between the tree pollens, mountain cedar, grass, and weeds - there's something pollinating all year long that she's allergic to.  She started them in October 2012.  They said it could take 6 mos to a year to start seeing results.  Three months in and her skin is horrific.  I mean, I've said many times in the past year that her skin is the worst it's ever been, and I feel like her skin is telling me, "oh you think so?  You ain't seen nothin' yet!"  I am SOOO hopeful though, because her skin seems to flare exceptionally the day she gets her injection.  While it is soooo hard to watch her be so miserable right now, I just know that once her immunity is built up from the injections, her skin will clear up.  I just know it.  It got so bad over Christmas, that we decided to put her another round of prednisone.  It always clears her up immediately, but she usually flares worse again after she stops.  And that is exactly what happened.  Not to mention that the steroids have REALLY affected her negatively.  We decided to completely stop ALL steroid use.  We have noticed a HUGE change in her.  Her intense anxiety has vanished.  She is a happy little girl again!  We are so thankful for that!