E is for Eczema

You know how when kids are learning sounds and how to read?  A is for apple, etc.  Well to Truitt, E is for Eczema.  That's because Kembia developed severe eczema over the summer, and our days and nights have been filled with medicine and wet wraps.



It started with some itchy bumps in her elbow.  Which quickly spread up her arms onto her chest and back.  When it migrated onto her face, I knew we had a major problem.  And she was super conscious about the bumps on her face.

I'd tried all sorts of salves and balms to help her but nothing worked.  We finally took her in where she saw a fantastic team of doctors and was diagnosed with what we already knew to be eczema.

We now have 4 separate medicines to use, two for when she's really bad, two for when she's sort of bad, and a fifth internal medicine that's kind of like Benadryl on steroids.  And we should probably be buying stock in Vaseline.

And then there's the wet wrap.  Or the baby burrito as we affectionately call it.

It goes something like this:  spread medicine on child, in the mean time have towel in the dryer, and long sleeve shirt soaking in warm to hot water.  Wring out shirt, put on child, wrap child in warm towel, sit for 30 minutes, slather in vaseline.

It sounds like some sort of elaborate beauty ritual.  Kembia loves it, which I think is so weird.  But it helps a lot.  We've gotten the eczema under control, but if we skip a wet wrap two days in a row, her eczema starts to come back very quickly.

We're a tad bit nervous about winter and all the dry weather coming up since eczema tends to be the worst then, but at least I feel like we have a fighting chance.  And finally good health insurance to help us along the way....