Do you ever eat your words? Well I am eating my words BIG TIME over here. Poor baby Emmett has had quite a painful month. It all started October 10th. I know this because that's when the "heat rash" appeared on Emmett's face that was later diagnosed as eczema... but this eczema is the eczema from hell!! As so many have graciously offered... lots of babies have eczema, "...but not that bad." Thanks dude.
I remember a gathering with the Rose family when Emmett was bran-baby-new. My mother in-law asked me if I was watching what I eat. "Heck no! I eat what I want!" I responded, confident in my new ability to rock this motherhood thing, while Emmett slept and ate like a champion.
Cue October, and Emmett was not his normal, happy self. I didn't think much of it. Thinking it was a growth spurt, or whatever, I knew it would work out in time and he would be back to normal. Then right before I left for Leavenworth Emmett's face was so inflamed, it was beginning to Crack and ooze. It began spreading over his whole body, with more cracking and bleeding/oozing.
All the while we were trying everything we could think of. Cue intervention with various opinions of doctors and nurses. What I've learned through this experience is you have to put your big mama pants on and be the advocate for your child - harping on doctors and nurses until you get help. We had tons of phone calls to the pediatrician office, only to be put through to various phone nurses and on-call doctors. Hydrocortisone was quickly prescribed with miscommunication running high between various doctor and pharmacy visits. And thus the irony, the mom who was avoiding plastic and phthalates was now putting steroids all over her baby.
We saw some relief, but here again came the frustration: doctors only seemed to want to treat his symptoms vs finding out the real cause. I scheduled another appointment. His rash was at its worst. The doc finally gave me a glimmer of hope for answers: allergies. We did blood work - I'll remember the phlobotomist drawing his blood from his tiny arm - my job was to hold him still so they could get it right. Ugh.
A week goes by. I'm calling the office daily now because they said we would have results in 2 days, 3 tops. All the while, we are dealing with people's frustrating comments. "Oh, is that a rash...?" "Oh, his face doesn't look too good, are you putting anything on it?" ... are they just trying to be helpful? Of course! Are these comments very helpful? Not so much.
Last night a triage nurse FINALLY called with some answers - and they mean big adjustments. Emmett has allergies to egg whites, peanuts, milk, and soy. And dog dander. Those first three aren't a big deal - but soy is in basically every processed food on the planet. Goodbye Pad Thai! And every other favorite food of mine! Yesterday was my first day eating gluten, wheat, corn, dairy, and nut free - all I can say is if I stick to this to continue breastfeeding, I am going to get SKI-NNY!! yikes. And we are still working out a plan for Jackson.
It's been 24 hours and we have already seen a huge difference. I'm grateful to finally have answers. I'm grateful Emmett is happy again. And I'm grateful for that distant day when I can eat Pad Thai again.
In other news, we had Justin's birthday last week. Or as I like to say, birthday weekend! We had a pie pig out with his family on Saturday - yum! Friday he took the day off and we had a yummy crepe breakfast, Red Robin lunch, and we saw Dr. Strange. Thursday night we made pie together and he opened his gifts.
I made coconut cream pie - yum!
Those are all our happenings. For now I anxiously await the healing of Emmett's skin.
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