early adventures

I wish I had stared this back then but I just want to say that my early efforts were met with much resistance from the family who still do not want to support me in my efforts to make Caleb healthy. It's really hard to get people to understand that just because having the things he's allergic too is not going to cause immediate death, as with anaphalatic shock or something, it's still harming him. Although we were not able to eliminate everything the first few months we did some and Dr. Lions seemed kind of amazed at the improvement in his eczema and his "allergic shiners". I guess there is really no clinical evidence that a restrictive diet is helpful for food allergies that come in with low numbers but he could not deny there was a huge improvement. I have to note that the elidel is not the lone cause for improvement because we haven't needed to use it. Extra steps were taken such as getting mattress and pillow covers, removing chemical cleaning products from our home, etc. We often talk about getting an air purifier too, but it hasn't made it's way into the budget. I would love to think that modifications to the environment would rid him all all allergies and asthma once and for all but that is really unlikely to happen since he's allergic to trees and grass.... can't really get away from those things. So, for now it looks like medicine is an absolute necessity. I am happy to say that we use elidel very very infrequently and have not used albuterol in MONTHS. We'll see what this spring brings. Many people ask me if he'll outgrow this. I don't know, it happens, especially with food allergies but it's not something I spend time hoping for we just live in the moment. If he is the same or no better by the time he is 6 I think that I will ask for a referral to an allergist to get a better understanding of his triggers. For, now we are controlling things very well and having been a human pin cushion myself, I am hesitant to do that to him when he's so young.