eczema? in Bf baby, advice please

[timewastingaway]

Hi,
My DS is almost 5 months and EBF, has never had any formula or solids.
Every now and again, but only recently he will get little flare ups of what looks to be dry skin.He has a patch on his face that has been there a while and the odd bit on his arms but today i noticed it was quite a bit more, he has patches on his back and tummy.
I have 2 other DC's but they were both ff, never had eczema.
Im not implying that FF prevented this before any one jumps on me it's just making me think that perhaps it is something i am eating that is causing it.
I have heard something about Dairy being a poss cause and i have been eating a hell of a lot of Ben and Jerry's lately and i'm not even joking

Does anyone have any ideas? It is only mild at the moment but i am worried it might get worse.Could it be something like the detergent i am using? although i am using non bio products...

any advice would be gratefully received, thanks in advance

Hi, my baby had this too and he was bf til he was a year. I am also an eczema sufferer too. Go to the doctor or the health visitor and get a cream called epaderm , it works wonders. My son is now 2 years old and now as long as I cream him twice a day I have no problems. I even find with my skin the quicker you respond to flare ups the easier they are to settle. Also usually the cause is enviromental, probably nothing to do with what you are eating. Hope this helps.

It could be caused by various things, food intolerances can be an issue, or washing powders etc.

If you are interested in getting to the bottom of it, it might be worth trying some different washing powders and/or eliminating various foods from your diet, you have to eliminate each food for a period of two weeks, though.

Quite often if it is an intolerance they grow out of them. You can also treat it with a cream, if it is mild, rather than worrying about food intolerances which can be a pain to manage. Of course, if it did become worse it might be an avenue to explore. Up to you if you want to try it now or not. You often need to be really strict with it though and avoid anything which contains even traces of the allergen. A friend of mine is breastfeeding her son who is allergic to soy and dairy and has to make her own bread because so much of it contains soy flour! :(

i would recommend Aveeno cream as a moisterizer to use daily to keep on top of the dry skin. My ds2 had really bad eczema when he was a baby and he was bf, and i hardly eat any dairy as am intolerant to it (have a little marg and the odd bit of cheese!), he's now 3 and has grown out of it but does still get dry skin. I scoured tyhe internet looking for recommendations of creams as the ones i was getting over the counter seemed to be not helping at all and someone recommended Aveeno which you can get from boots. We had to use steroid cream for a couple of the flareups but used to smother him in Aveeno.
The other good bit of advice i was given was to let him have a bath with a sockful of porridge oats (sock/tights filled with porridge oats abd tied up tightly) as the cream that the oats produce is really soothing.

don't let anyone prescribe aqueous cream. They WILL keep doing this, and it is really bad for most eczema sufferers.

Aveeno and epaderm are both really good.

Just wanted to say thank you for the replies, all very helpful

Hiya,
Didnt want to ignore your post as all 3 of my babies have suffered from bad baby eczema. DC1 was FF, DC's 2&3 EBF. We were prescribed all sorts of creams & lotions & potions from the GP, some of which worked well, some which didnt. I found that my babies eczema flared up badly when they were teething - the usual spots, back of knee's, in elbows, sometimes all over the torso. Even when I stayed on top of creams etc, they would get flare ups. I too only use non-bio washing powder, although sometimes a change of brand might cause a small flare up (I tend to go for whatever is on special offer as we get through SO much washing now with 3 kids, I do like a washing liquid bargain!!).

I also tried to cut things out of my diet when nursing DC2 (Still nursing 6mo DC3) to see if it helps the flare-ups, but it didnt seem to make any difference.

Bathing in Oilatum or Aveeno every night, steroid creams if bad, epaderm if mild, double base / diprobase all over skin. There is loads to try & it might be trial & error until you find something that suits your baby.

PLeased to say that DC1 & DC2 have pretty much grown out of the eczema now (ages 5 & 3), DC3 still gets it quite bad at times, but we just go with it.