Still Here!

Sorry for the down time. Life has been super intense with Lily's reactions.

In brief, we started seeing a shiatsu Chinese Medicine Practitioner a week ago. He showed us some accupressure for Lily. He also gave her some herbs to help with detox and healing and to lessen inflammation. In reviewing our history, he really focused on the months surrounding when Lily's major eczema first appeared. In talking with him, it became apparent that the croup, the random vomiting, the mystery fever and the lingering eczema/rashes are signs that her body was trying to fight something off and didn't win. He says that childhood rashes can be mysterious but he is confident we will figure it out together. I am willing to embark on this journey with him. He comes very highly recommended by several people I know.

When you see it in print like that, it sounds so stupidly obvious. But the eczema came and then a few weeks later the croup. And then that healed and then a few weeks later she got a high fever. And just thrown in there intermittently she had a few sporadic days of vomiting. So, we were just in survival mode, getting through each malady as it occurred. Also Dave was in his last semester at school and I was 5 or 6 months pregnant with Aevryn at the time, so there was a lot going on. If everything had come on, all at once, presenting together, I think we would have thought things were very seriously wrong and perhaps we would have responded more critically. I don't know. We're here now, though, and that's what matters.

We have a referral to an allergist on Oct 8. It will be very interesting to see what he has to say. Our holistic pediatrician recommends him and says he's very open-minded. Hey, I will always talk to a new person about Lily. Everyone's perspective is welcome.

And finally, we are on the schedule for a new patient appointment for the dermatologist for -- get this -- February 17. Yikes. Our nurse practitioner says she will send our file with a note and hopefully the doctor will review it and bump us up to an earlier slot.

This is all on top of Lily having her third occurrence of a strangely cyclical full body rash. At first, we thought it was swimmer's itch or maybe hand-foot-mouth, especially since she had a low fever for a day or two. The second time we were concerned, so went to the doctor's, only to be told she was just as stumped as we were. This third time seemed to be triggered by a trip downstate to my aunt's house (she also had a hive-y allergic reaction to my aunt's tiny dog). Unlike the previous two cycles, this one is not getting better on its own. We treated her, Friday, with a topical insecticide in case it was mites. That seemed to help, but as of yesterday evening (Tuesday) little bumps were back (on top of the full body scabs since she'd rubbed herself raw itching).

I am consumed with this. I don't even know what to do anymore. We're back to giving her one nightly dose of benadryl when the itch gets to be too much, just so she can get some sleep. This is not where I want to be.

Coconut Ice Cream

Here is a link to a fabulous ice cream recipe. We made it just by putting it in a bowl in the freezer and stirring intermittently. We just got an ice cream maker (brand new from a thrift store for $5!!) so we will try that tomorrow. After 10 months of no ice cream of any kind, it was heavenly. Even Dave, who has had ice cream in recent times, said it was really good. Time to experiment. I will report back.