Our story of battling eczema began at about 6 weeks of age (coincidentally enough, after the first lot of vaccines). It first started as cradle cap, and few tiny spots at the creases in the elbows. The cradle cap kept getting worse, regardless of all the oils I tried (and brushing the cap away), and few tiny red spots started to appear on the face, and chest.

My GP and Plunket nurse told me, "its just eczema, it will go away, you just need to apply lotions".. so I tried... and Eczema unleashed its fury! Apparently my kid had very sensitive skin, so he started to react to any lotions I tried to use and we had a massive flare up. It just didn't stop there, it kept happening, and it felt like having a nightmare that you don't wake up from - he was getting redder and redder, everywhere on his body!

So my search began for the answers! I tried all sorts of natural products, (everyone at the pharmacy knows me now) from Aveno to Avene, I spent hundreds, if not thousands on trying new things.

My mum joined me in buying us things from USA / Canada / Australia, searching for the right thing, but all to no avail.

As bubs was getting older, he started to rub his face and after he was about 3 months old, he started to get red crusty spots on his face, that would bleed and weep (again, coincidentally it got worse after his second lot of vaccines).

A hot New Zealand summer didn't help, and one day I came to find my little bundle screaming in my pain and his whole face was now red, and bleeding, and weeping..it was all WET!!! I had NO idea what had

happened!

That night I stayed up all night crying and researching and that's how I found the Bamboo Bubby website and some information on triggers etc... and the magic ScratchMeNot sleeves!

The next morning we were urgently seen by the GP and then followed by the Dermatologist appointment. At all the appointments we kept ending up getting more prescription for steroid creams etc... and that was IT!

I was getting very frustrated by this, as I knew there was something going on internally.

Since I was breastfeeding, I had to go on very strict diet (no dairy, soy, gluten, plus the naturopath tests showed he was also allergic to tomatoes, and preservatives). Great for me, I lost 5 kgs in one week, but awful for baby, as the milk lost all its fatness so he was starving! I remained on the diet for another 4 months, but it didn't make any difference. He was still itching and scratching (but thanks to those ScratchMeNot sleeves, he wasn't getting infected). So on the advice of the doctors, we put my baby on special formula and his solid food was very much restricted, but still it didn't make much difference!

So after about 9 months of sleep deprivation and constant itching I'd had enough and the last straw was when the daycare that my son was in worsened his situation by giving him honey, sending on him on another massive flare up, but also, took the sleeves off him, so by the time I came to pick him up he was covered in blood, EVERYWHERE!!! I was beside myself. The daycare was at fault, but I knew I was to blame too, for trying to give my child a "normal" upbringing and letting him go to daycare while I returned to work to earn more money so we could keep buying new things to try (vicious cycle here, you see).

So, I rang my relatives and friends back home (I am from Tajikistan originally) and told them about our misery here and they told me to come, and we would be seen by the best doctors. So, without thinking twice, I bought the tickets for both of us and hopped on the plane. It took us two days to get there, with scratching baby all the way, I was in pieces by the time we got home. And the next day, we went from one doctor to the next...

The first thing that the doctors did differently was:

1. Take a stool sample. (They believe everything that happens to the body,comes from the gut, so in order to understand the symptoms,they need to find the cause)

2. Urine test.

3. Blood test.

Then after having results from that, they could propose a plan of action.

The results showed that my son had a Staphylococcus infection (more commonly known as Staph)in his gut, and the gut flora was in very bad shape, causing his largest organ - the skin, react to it CONSTANTLY......so....if the doctors in New Zealand could only do the STOOL SAMPLE and see what was going on inside, we could have saved my son the countless tries with various creams etc......

The stool sample was also great at showing what antibiotics he was sensitive to, so the doctors knew what to prescribe and how to treat it.

He also had E.Coli, which was not good either...

So we had a plan...

1. Antibiotics to treat Staph.
2. Probiotics to treat the gut
3. Antihistamines to subside the allergy reactions
4. Liquid form of calcium chlorine (not sure what would it be like in this part of the world, but there, it seen as "clearing out " blood).
5. And the cream, the only one that EVER helped, called TRIDERM...(they dont have it in NZ by the way....)
6. Bath in chamomile (real dried flower) and few other herbs.
7. Green tea wet patches on very sore places.

The blood test showed he was also allergic to cats (yuppie, we have a cat :( ), carrots, apples, and rice....adding that to all other things ...

We also had to go back to basics, just formula, and then try to add one thing at a time and see what he reacted to. After doing this he also reacted to chicken, eggs, fish and even marmite so far.

So, after treating him for 10 days with almost everything, we hit his system inside out. He was getting whiter day by day and I could not believe my eyes! After almost a year, my boy was finally getting right!!

The hardest thing was to leave my country and come back to New Zealand, as I was still afraid he would be reacting to the environment,.

We have been back in New Zealand for over a month now, he's been scratching a little bit, but mostly when he is tired or sleepy or annoyed at something.

We have also been free from our ScratchMeNot sleeves for 2 months!!! WOHOOOOOOOOO!!

Fingers cross he will remain on the better side, but I will probably try to go back home again next year and get him seen again over there. If only the NZ doctors could test him, but apparently they don't do tests like this in NZ (particularly, stool samples).

So I would urge all mums out there:

DO NOT GIVE UP! Listen to your gut, if you think there is something else to it, you might be very right!!!

I am hoping to maybe set up a little organisation in Tajikistan to bring eczema kids there from Australia/New Zealand for treatment, so perhaps instead of spending hundreds or even thousands of dollars on special creams and food and clothing, we could get them seen by the doctors and set them straight early on :))

Thank you for reading our story and if anybody wants to contact me, feel free to email zebunisso@gmail.com

Thank you