The mysterious rash continues

I never thought I would write so often about ‘Timan’s health issues when I started this blog. But it seems like that’s what I’m doing every couple of weeks. Because it’s really bothering me and what parent wants to see the child suffering. Yuck.

In the first 2 1/2 years of his life the tot had no problem what so ever. Apart from a couple of throwing up incidents, which cleared within less than six hours, he didn’t have a single health problem, nothing, nada, nuet.

But starting about half a year ago it seems like we don’t get out of the sickness circle. First the stomach problems that ended with a ruptured appendix, two surgeries and a stay in UCI and now a mysterious rash that we can’t seem to get rid of.

‘Timan’ has this nasty itchy rash all over his body. It started early July and I thought it was a simple Prickly Heat Rash. But now I’m convinced it isn’t and actually never was. Another three weeks have passed since I fist wrote about it. We did three more visits to the Pediatrician and we are still dealing with it. And it actually has gotten worse.

Both times, about 2 days after the oral hydrocortisone stopped, the rash came back. Another treatment with stronger oral antibiotics followed, because by now the little one was diagnosed with a staph infection. But in spite of oral antihistamines he kept scratching himself bloody at night.

And every morning the tot wakes up with one or both eyes swollen. He was given oral hydrocortisone because the swelling didn’t go away but now his eyes look normal after one or two hours, but the itching persists.  The next thing is completely dry and itchy skin around the eyes, the excessive scratching and wiping is turning the whole area red and irritated.

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The pictures might not look too alarming, but the itching and pain the rash is causing must be very intense.

The whole situation is extremely frustrating, for ‘Timan’ maybe not so much as for me. I wake him up at night to take his 4th dose of antibiotics just to find him moving from one side to the other in his sleep and scratching his whole body. He’s taking oral antihistamine twice a day, I apply moisturizer in form of unscented petroleum jelly for sensitive baby skin numerous times a day and in the middle of the night and he still keeps scratching himself bloody, especially on the side of his thighs and behind his knees.

And the rash on the rest of his body doesn’t disappear anymore. So much I want to help my little son, but nothing seems to work. He is getting more and more restless, I feel his behaviour is changing too and I have to admit, I’m feeling I’m reaching my limit as well.

The Pediatrician, the only private one on the island, told me the next step would be looking for the reason in our house, the environment we are living in. But still, she doesn’t want to label his rash as an Atopic Dermatitis, as of yet. Which is good I guess.

My gut feeling is that it was (and still is) caused by an allergic reaction.

We need to find the cause for ‘Timan’s allergy and this is not an easy task, especially here in Paradise. There are no patch tests available here and there is no dermatologist in the country either.

I wrote about my suspicion before and now I’m almost 100% convinced that all this is caused by our tap water. The water in the two storage lakes on the island is getting less and less and the water quality worse by the minute. The PUC (Public Utilities Corporation, responsable for the water treatment) has changed or increased the chemicals. Whatever chemicals they are using, Chlorine, Chloramine or something else (nobody can tell me for sure), they are the culprits that are causing the rash. Sometimes I have the feeling I’m itching too, caused by the water or by my imagination, I don’t know.

Nevertheless I’m also considering a food allergy even tough I hardly believe it is. The only thing I can think of adding to ‘Timan’s diet in the last two or three month is olive oil.

But anyway, a couple of days ago I took him off milk, cheese, yoghurt, foods with flavor enhancers (E635 and such) and olive oil.

However the most important change was using bottled water for everything. For ‘Timan’ to drink, cook food he’s eating, brush his teeth, wash his hands and take his bath. But how do I get the chemicals out of the laundry? And we keep hoping ‘Timan’s skin is going to take a turn for the better. But when?

Did you ever have such an itchy rash all over the body or eczema caused by chemicals in the tap water (e.g. Chlorine or Chloramine)? How and after what time did the symptoms clear?

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Do you want to know what happened later? Find out here:

‘The mysterious rash – did we get rid of the eczema? (part 1)‘ – January 6, 2012

and read how we got rash and eczema under control without steroids:

‘The mysterious rash -  did we get rid of the eczema? (part 2)‘ – January 9, 2012

Every person is reacting differently, it’s a matter of finding out what works for you. Good luck.

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