I thought a blog may be the easiest way of recording little Jasmine’s journey as we stumble our way trying to relieve her suffering with eczema.
A little history:
Jasmine is our 1st. She popped out following a marathon labour on the 13th February 2008, a day early 
She didn’t cry when she arrived, content to watch everything with the biggest blue eyes. She remains as natural as we can muster. Following a painstaking review of all the available material (for and against) we made the decision to avoid vaccines.
Her suffering with eczema began roughly two weeks into her little life, starting as ‘cradle cap’ and working its way down her face to her chest, arms and legs. Despite the infernal itch she remains amazingly tolerant. She scratches when her skin is exposed for changing, and tears at her head when she is tired and/or frustrated.
She has a beautiful smile and a gutsy chuckle, though it can take some goading to get it out of her!
I wish there was more we could do to take that itch away. I wish I could make her comfortable. So with this blog I plan to document the trials and tribulations we have faced and will face as we attempt to control her flare-ups and ultimately (hopefully) rid her of this ailment.
Maybe some of you will be able to draw parallels with what we have gone through. I hope this will be of some use. I wouldn’t wish this on anyone!
Of course all this now extends to Willow who is blessed to have had Jasmine blaze a trail for her and consequently suffers far less but none-the-less is exposed in many of the same ways.
Hello Parents of Jasmine! My name is Ly Nguyen. I am a young mother at the age of 20. I have a 9-month baby boy named Constantine. I found your site through ECZtra! and started reading some of your blogs. I would love to give some input into helping you conquer your daughter’s eczema. My son started developing eczema around 4 months of age. His eczema wasn’t extreme. His pediatrician diagnosed it as “patches of eczema.” He had patches all over his back, upper thighs, shoudlers, and belly. I kept my baby moisturized by applying Eucerin, Aveeno, Baby Naturals, and steroids given to me from his pediatrician. None of these seem to work.
Your baby’s eczema doesn’t compare to my baby’s eczema, but I would say we are both willing to try almost anything to help heal our babies.
So, from parent to parent… mother to mother… I HIGHLY recommend this product I’ve ordered from a company called Melaleuca. Put it on your “yet to try” list or better yet, try it now.
The product is called Renew. It’s a lotion that has been clinically proven to help heal dry skin conditions. I’ve been applying it on my son for about a month now, and his eczema is almost gone. There’s only one little stubborn patch left.
Before I ordered Renew, I asked myself a couple questions.
1. What makes this lotion different from the other ones on the market?
2. THAT’S IT!? One lotion and that will heal my son’s eczema? How come I haven’t heard of this lotion before?
For the first question, there’s a video that will explain the answer. Go to this website: http://www.Melaleuca.com/Renew
You should see a video pop-up and everything in the background goes dim.
I also heard about some people’s personal experiences with using Melaleuca’s lotion and their products. They’re very successful stories. One story was about a mom who had a son with bleeding eczema. She tried the Melaleuca products and her son’s eczema started showing improvements within 3 days. It’s sounds like a miracle, right? This is what convinced to try Melaleuca and I’m so glad I did.
For the second question, the best way to answer that question, is to show you through an online presentation. It will explain all the information you would need to know.
So, if you would please, e-mail me or comment back, I would really love help you end your daughter’s battle with eczema.
Hi ly, thanks for your comment. I’ll look into the renew brand but if I’m honest, it comes across as a marketing push, particularly from the results when you Google the products.
We’ve yet to try variants of tea-tree oil applications, though I’d favour the oil over a product that contains its derivatives bundled in with the usual suspects. I’m surprised done of the products are perfumed. I wish you continued good luck with your sons eczema, I’ll keep an eye on the product.
I’m sorry I sounded like I was marketing something. I was afraid I was going to sound like that
and I really didn’t mean to. I have trouble putting emotion into my writing, and I REALLY do want to help. I have put so much confidence in this product because I’ve seen what it can do, but when I talk about it, it just doesn’t sound right. All I want to do is help, but I can’t get the right words out..
Will you take a look at the presentation I was talking about? It is worth watching..I promise. I tear-ed up while watching it. The reason being, I am a single stay-at-home mom. I don’t have anybody who will babysit, nor do I want anyone else to babysit my baby. I don’t get anything from the father to support my baby because he doesn’t have anything to offer. I don’t help in any of the bills that my parents pay, or anything that has to do with money. I live off my parent’s income and I HATE THAT. They’re struggling with money already and I wish I could help them, but I don’t. I have a baby instead. Don’t get me wrong, I LOVE my baby. It’s just..I had him at the wrong time of my life. Does that make sense? And so, I was feeling helpless and a little ashamed. At the same time, my mom was yelling me because she thought I wasn’t doing anything for my baby’s eczema. She has had 6 kids, and she has never seen anything like eczema…so she doesn’t know what it is. She always tells me to bring him to the doctor. The doctor gave me steroids, if they don’t work, what am I going to do? I thought, I just gotta keep moisturizing, try to find other solutions and hope it goes away.
Then I watch the presentation, and it’s the solution I have been waiting for…for A LONG TIME. I was SO SO SO happy that I almost cried.
What do you say? Will you watch the presentation? We don’t know each other, we are pretty much strangers. But, I am willing to promise to you that this WILL heal your daughter’s eczema. THAT is how much confidence I have with Melaleuca and their Renew lotion.
I didn’t quite understand what you said about “particularly from the results when you Google the products.”
Alright, so I’m not getting any responses from you. After this comment, I won’t be contacting you anymore. As I said, I wanted to help. Eczema can be caused by anything. From what I understand, to help heal eczema, you’ve got to take all the irritants out the equation. Here is some information. If you’re not using organic or all-natural ingredient products in your home, that could be one of the causes of eczema and other potentially dangerous illnesses.
Environmental Protection Agency studies have shown that indoor air pollution can be 3 to 70 times higher than outdoors.
Almost 50% of all illness is due to poor indoor air quality [1989 State of Massachusetts Study]
150 chemicals found in the home have been connected to allergies, birth defects, cancer and psychological disorders. [The Consumer Protection Agency)
In an EPA report to the US Congress regarding the Indoor Air Quality Act of 1989, they stated that indoor air quality is one of the nation's most important environmental health problems.
Some products release contaminants into the air right away, others do so gradually over a period of time. Some stay in the air up to a year. These contaminants, found in many household and personal care products can cause dizziness, nausea, allergic reactions, eye/skin/respiratory tract irritations and some cause cancer. [American Lung Association]
In 1901, cancer was rare: 1 out of 8,000. Since the Industrial Revolution, the cancer rate today has risen to 1 in 3 and is not improving. [The American Cancer Society]
Even small doses of neurotoxins, which would be harmless to an adult, can alter a child’s nervous system development. [Environmental Health Perspectives 106 Supplement 3:787-794 (June 1998)]
Out of 2,435 pesticide poisonings in a one-year period, over 40% were due to exposure to disinfectants and similar cleaning products in the home. [State of California Study]
Developing cells in children’s bodies are more susceptible to damage than adult cells that have completed development, especially for the central nervous system. During the development of a child, from conception through adolescence, there are particular windows of vulnerability to environmental hazards. Most disturbing – until a child is approximately 13 months of age, they are virtually no ability to fight the biological and neurological effects of toxic chemicals. [Herbert L. Needleman, M.D., Philip J. Landrigan, M.D., Raising Children Toxic Free]
Today, children have chemical exposures from birth that their parents didn’t have until they were adults. Because children are exposed to toxics at an earlier age than adults, they have more time to develop environmentally triggered diseases, with long latency periods, such as cancer. [Environmental Policy and Children's Health, Future of Children, Summer/Fall 1995; 5(2): 34-52]
Household bleaches which claim to disinfect are classified as pesticides under the Federal Hazardous Substances Act. Inadvertently mixing bleach with other cleaners that contain ammonia produces a toxic chloramines gas. These toxic gases can cause coughing, loss of voice, a feeling of burning or suffocation, and even death. [Source: Guide to Hazardous Products Around the Home, Household Hazardous Waste Project, 1989]
Formaldehyde is a highly toxic substance and one of the most common indoor air pollutants. It is a highly suspected cancer-causing agent. It is an irritant to the eyes, nose, throat and lungs and may cause a wide variety of reactions, including skin reactions, ear infections, headaches, depression, joint pain, dizziness, nausea, fatigue, vomiting, sleep disturbances, and many more. How many of these names would you have recognized as formaldehyde? Manufactures can legally use over 30 different trade names for this chemical. Below are some:
(http://www.fda.gov/ohrms/dockets/dailys/02/Aug02/080602/98f-0052-sup0014-vol5.txt and http://www.epa.gov/iaq/formalde.html for more info on formaldehyde)
Formalin
Quaternium-15 (formaldehyde releasing agent)
Methanal
Methyl Aldehyde
Methylene Oxide
Oxymethylene
Bfv*
Fannoform*
Formol*
Fyde*
Karsan*
Methaldehyde
Formalith*
Methylene Glycol
Ivalon*
Oxomethane
Formalin 40
Formic Aldehyde
Hoch
Paraform
Lysoform*
Morbocid
Trioxane
Polyoxmethylene
*denotes trade name
QUATERNIUM-15 IS FOUND IN JOHNSON’S AND JOHNSON’S BABY SHAMPOO! It is found in other baby products as well: http://consumerist.com/2009/03/baby-products-now-with-formaldehyde.html
Hi Ly,
Sorry for the lack of response, we’ve been so crazy busy/tired with the little ones that I didn’t even notice I had new comments