Parenting, Child Eczema

Why Your Child’s Eczema Isn’t Improving (Even with Creams and Dietary Changes)

If you’re reading this, chances are you’ve already tried a lot of different things to help heal your childs eczema break outs. Different creams, cortisone, antibiotics and the dreaded diet changes. Maybe you’ve even tried cutting out dairy and gluten, struggling to find things your child will eat in the process. And yet… their eczema is still there. Or it improves for a little while, and then flares up again without any obvious reason.

Understanding Child Eczema

It’s exhausting and confusing, especially when you do ALL the things you’ve been told to by your doctor and paediatrician and nothing works.

I’m here to share with you the good news, that there is another way! Traditionally eczema has been looked at as a skin issue, and treated topically with creams, ointments and bleach baths. And while these can helpmanage symptomsfor a time, they don’t address the underlying drivers. This is because eczema is usually not about the skin, and it isn’t a topical issue. It is an internal issue reflecting on the skin.

Eczema and the Gut connection

One of the biggest pieces I see missing in traditional eczema treatment isgut health. The gut and immune system are so closely connected, and the skin is often where this imbalance will show up in children. A big driver of this is microbiome imbalance. Our microbiome is the community of bacteria and fungi that live inside of us, and play a huge roll in immunity, inflammation and digestion. When the microbiome becomes imbalanced that is when we see increased food sensitivities, skin flare ups that are hard to settle, and ongoing inflammation in the body.

With microbiome imbalances, certain bacteria may be overgrown, while beneficial ones are lacking. This can then lead to the immune system being on high alert, responding more strongly than it needs to. Food can also trigger symptoms, but often it’s not the root cause. Instead, it’s usually a sign the gut needs support and that there is an underlying low level of inflammation present. Even if the skin looks calmer for a time, the underlying inflammation can still be there.

Why Removing More and More Foods Doesn’t Always Work

In clinic I see this a lot. Mums are doing their absolute best to help their child’s eczema, and end up cutting out more foods in the hope of finding the culprit. But the list of no foods keeps growing and things still aren’t improving long-term. This comes down to the gut. If it isn’t being supported the body continues reacting, and this is even to healthy foods.
That’s why a more targeted, supportive approach tends to work better than food restriction alone.

Microbiome testing for children's eczema

This is where deeper investigation can be really helpful. A complete microbiome Map test looks at the composition of your microbiome, how the body is digesting foods, inflammatory markers, the health of the gut lining and so much more. It helps us to understand what your child’s body is actually dealing with internally. This is the test, don’t guess approach, which gives us test results and a clear path forward based on those results.

What healing eczema often looks like

When we support the body properly, things shift in a sustainable way. This looks like a slow and steady improvement in eczema flare ups, less intense reactions, less and less use of steroid creams over time until you don’t need them anymore, and a more settled and resilient system. It isn’t something that happens immediately over night, but slowly and steadily, which means the body can maintain the changes.

If you're feeling stuck on how to heal your child's eczema

You haven’t missed something, you haven’t done anything wrong and you are definitely NOT alone! Most parents are never shown the full picture of eczema at their GP or Pediatrician's office. But there is always a reason your child’s body is responding this way. When we look deeper, we can understand what that reason is, and how to support your child properly.
If your child has been stuck in the eczema cycle, and you’re ready to look deeper, this is exactly what I help families work through.

Please get in touch with me via the contact tab and let's talk about,

Ally