Skin Problems…
…I feel so helpless.
My daughter has pretty much always had eczema. We have battled that off and on her whole life. Due to her itchy skin and tendency toward drier skin, she has also had a couple of battles with MRSA. I think what happened is those cases was she scratched a couple of little open sores and picked up the virus at school.
So, now there is something new happening with her skin and I was just without a clue when I first saw it. I think it was about three weeks ago that she developed some little hard bumps all over her arms and legs, mostly around the areas where she would generally get eczema patches. Also, on one of he knees she got a patch of skin that did not feel rough, but looked rather like elephant skin. It was unsightly and looked a little like something her dad gets on his own knees. Additionally, she had two three larger red spots on her lower back that looked like hives, but without the white raised parting the center.
I kept her moisturized and put her Betamethasone on the bad spots, but after a weekend at her dad’s, she came home even worse. I suspected the trip to the beach they made as well as the cat he has at his house. Gigi is allergic to cats and being around a cat would have taxed her immune system and not left any fight in her for her skin issues.
So, I got her in with my dermatologist. The derm changed her antihistamine and her skin creams. We were on an entirely new regiment and each of the medications had a $45 co-pay, so it was quite an investment. Also, we went back to the skin care products we used when Gigi was a baby: Aveeno lotion, sunscreen and bath wash for babies – not the adult version, but the baby variety.
She was with her dad again this weekend and I brought her home early since tonight was her pre-school graduation presentation. Her skin is even worse! It has been 10 days on the new antihistamine and the new creams. I should see SOME improvement, but instead her entire back is just covered with the splotchy, red, raised spots. It’s horrific, really.
So, my next call is to her allergist. He is very difficult to get in with, but I am going to beg, because my next step will be to find a specialist that can see if this is something systemic. I don’t know – maybe an endocrinologist or an immunologist.
I’m all cried out on this one.
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