Dear Kathleen, My eldest daughter had quite severe eczema for the first 3 years of her life and continued scratching until she was about 4 years old. She was breastfed, homebirthed, unvaccinated - never had a drop of dairy (except for what was in my diet). I gradually eliminated just about. everything from my own diet until I was just eating carrots, zucchinis and rice. I tried organic detergent, eliminated other perfumed cleaners in the house, changed our diet to organic, got a vacuum cleaner with a hepa filter. It was an extremely stressful time in my life because despite trying to do everything perfectly I had a baby who got sick easily, didn't sleep and scratched endlessy. Mothers going through this deserv a huge amount of reassurance and support. What I did find very useful was baggy organic cotton pyjamas with sewn in feet and mittens - they helped us all get a good nights sleep. Keeping the skin covered with lightweight cotton clothes seemed to help. Frozen gel packs in the freezer were kept on hand for soothing itchy skin. I got a pack of those cheap white hand towels that are used in Chinese restaurants and wrapped them around the icepack. The towels which were also handy for scratching. I discovered that scratching with fingernails leaves the skin itchier than before while rubbing with a towel (especially if a bit old and rough) actually takes the itch away. My daughter still uses those towels when she gets a little flare up (and so do I if I got a mosquito bite:) ). I would assume that the most important thing would be to increase the milk production. Everyone needs to help mum out so she isn't stressing about the double rinsing and her diet, and feeling guilty that she isn't doing enough, or is doing something wrong, etc. so she can concentrate on that. Maureen Minchin has a good book which you can find on e-bay called 'food for thought'. It's quite old, but I don't know of anything else breastfeeding oriented that talks about allergies. I know that she is also doing a talk at GOLD12 >Maureen Minchin - BA (Hons) MA (Melb) TPTC TSTC
>In this presentation, Ms. Minchin will ensure participants are better informed about epigenetics and intergenerational aspects of ‘allergy’, along with helping them to identify >likely cases of food hypersensitivity. She will also discuss the effects of early artificial feeding, the growth of allergy over time, antibiotic exposure, gut dysbiosis, and immune >consequences. Ms. Minchin will provide information on how infant formula and food manufacturers have protected their products and used ill health symptoms in infants and >children to develop niche products. She will provide participants with information that allows them to be more respectful of the body’s natural protective responses by providing >a road map for identifying and dealing with young, distressed breastfed babies and families. After taking this presentation, health care providers will feel more confident in >assisting families dealing these issues. Hope this helps. If this can be any reassurance, my daughter continued to nurse until she was 8 and had wonderful skin for the second half of her nursing life:) AliceLLL Leader, Italy    		 	   		  
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