Eczema Experiments

Right around Christmas Malachi's inner knees turned bright pink. Maybe the extra layers of clothing or leggings triggered it, or eating more variety of solid foods, we don't know. Soon it was also showing up on his forehead, elbows, and under his earlobes. 

February 14: the scratches on his face are from a dishwasher incident unrelated to eczema

"Eczema," diagnosed the other moms at church, and sure enough he soon began to scratch at it.
Our first attempt to soothe it was to rub with coconut oil, since that is antibacterial, antifungal, and moisturizing. We melted in a few drops of lavender essential oil too since that is good for healing skin. This mixture seemed to take some of the dryness and roughness away. We still put this on 2-4 times a day.

The next thing we added (around February 12 I think) was a hazelwood necklace, which is supposed to help various problems in the body (eczema and reflux/heartburn are the most common uses I've heard) by absorbing acid and therefore correcting the pH of the body. Depending on the person's body chemistry, they last for around 6 months. Not all eczema is connected with a pH imbalance, but supposedly 70% of people see some improvement with the necklaces. I wanted to make sure that any improvements I noticed were not just wishful thinking, so I took pictures of his knees when I put the necklace on.

February 19

February 25

The necklace has been on for almost two weeks and I think there has been a definite improvement, although it is definitely still itching. The spots under his earlobes that were bleeding and cracking are completely gone, the dryness around the corners of his eyes is also gone (haven't been putting any oil there since it's so close to his eyes), and his knees look somewhat better too.

I hope that we can figure out what is triggering this, or that he outgrows it.