Our littlest GIANT has suffered from some pretty serious bouts of diaper rash. Our two oldest little GIANT's never got diaper rash when they were babies. Baby little GIANT's rashes have been so bad that his skin cracks and bleeds, he even has a little scar on his bum. :( It seems to be the most painful thing for him because he absolutely dreads diaper changing time, even when he is rash free.
When he first started getting these rashes, we asked the pediatrician what might be causing them and she said that most likely it's the acid in his poop caused by teething. So we trusted our doctor and applied the recommended creams and have been for the last 6 months.
Last night, our little GIANT woke up in the middle of the night screaming and crying in pain! We went to him and found that he had, yet again, another diaper rash. We got him cleaned up, creamed up and calmed down. Then, the rash got me thinking...the little GIANT isn't teething, he has all the teeth he will have until he is 2yrs old. I also started thinking about the last time he had a rash and it was before we took him off cow's milk. So I started talking to my mom about it and we rehashed what he had eaten in the last 24hrs. Due to the craziness of the (absolutely AMAZING) Wedding this weekend, we did whatever was easy and available to us.
Saturday, the day of the Wedding, my mom fed him some cottage cheese and applesauce (one of his fav's!) as a snack before leaving for the wedding. We are still trying to use up what we have around the house before we do the complete switch and she knew it was something he'd eat, since he is a picky little GIANT! At the wedding, he ate the cheddar and white cheddar popcorn party favor's as a snack while waiting for dinner to be served (he was STARVING). For dinner he was served mac and cheese, all of our little GIANT's favorite! None of what he ate had alarmed me, up until last night.
It all of a sudden made sense, the little GIANT had not had a diaper rash ONCE before he was put on cow's milk and fed dairy products. While I nursed him I avoided dairy to help keep his gas down as it seemed to bring him discomfort when I did eat things that were. Once he was old enough to eat dairy and have cow's milk, that's when the eczema and diaper rash began. Over the last few weeks that he has been drinking Almond milk and eating very little to almost no dairy, he's been diaper rash free and eczema free. In one 24hr period he had more dairy combined than in the last few weeks and ended up with another severe rash.
After doing some research and finding that a milk allergy and gluten allergy CAN be a definite cause to diaper rash as well as eczema, I am convinced that what is best for my little GIANT is to be Gluten and Dairy free without having to have a doctor tell me so! My own personal observations have pinpointed more probable cause than what my pediatrician has found. I find it frustrating and irritating that my pediatrician didn't help explore further the cause to his rashes. Just like how the Dr. said his eczema was due to the use of a pacifier, even though the eczema didn't go away when we stopped using it like the pediatrician said it would. I am a firm believer in medicine and do vaccinate my children, but I just wish that doctors wouldn't take one glance at a kid with a binki in his mouth and bumps on his face and assume that it's irritation from the binki they think they are too old to be using. Or, take a look at a red bum and see drool constantly dripping from his mouth and say it's a rash due to teething. It just seems like a cop-out of them actually doing what we're paying them a lot of money to do, which is take a look at the symptom and closely and carefully explore what the proper cause and diagnosis is. Believe me, after working in the medical field and being a manager of a well known bank, I know that it all comes down to time and money. They need to see lot's of patience in one day to make a good profit, which means they need to get them in and out as fast as possible and leads to the quickest most generic diagnosis that may not even be the actual cause!
I am taking a stand for my little GIANTS and refuse to stop with the basic diagnosis that is the first thing to come to the pediatrician's mind. I am committed to this journey to see if their specific health problems and overall health improves simply by eliminating processed, non-organic, unhealthy food. God called me to "Living Life with 3 little GIANTS" and it is a call that I won't refuse or take lightly. I am honored to be their mama and won't give up on providing them a life full of faith, hope, love and health!
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