Eczema and mom's diet

[louoftwo]

My 4 month old DS has broken out with Eczema from head to toe (literally) over the past two weeks and it continuing to get worse each day. Although I would love to have advice on dealing with his Eczema my real question is whether Eczema in an BF baby can stem from a mothers allergies.

I know that my system in out of whack. I'm sure I have an intolerance to certain foods and that I have a candida problem in my gut. Can a mother's intolerance affect the breast milk and cause allergy problems in a baby? I know that when I was an infant I had a severe allergy to dairy, along with a few other things, that caused eczema so badly that I was hospitalized for three months. I'm terrified that my little one's eczema will get worse than it all ready is.

This is all really new to me and I'm sure what to do and where to go from here so any help would be greatly appreciated.

[kjbrown92]

Yes definitely.
Eczema can be from environmental allergies, food allergies, or food intolerances. And they can react to your antigens.
You might want to start a food journal and see if you notice any connection between food and flareups.
If you aren't already using a hypoallergenic laundry detergent, I'd do that too.
The top intolerances are dairy, gluten, soy, and corn. Egg is added on for eczema. But it could be any food. Or environmental.

[Monkey Toes]

I don't know about your own intolerances changing your breastmilk, but it seems quite possible that your baby shares the same intolerances. Mine developed terrible eczema that we could minimize slightly with lukewarm baths and creams and such but it was completely solved when we discovered her dairy allergy and I cut it out completely from my diet. My guess is that your baby is reacting to something you're eating, not reacting to your issues specifically, though I don't know. If you're worried, cut out all the common allergens and slowly reintroduce them. Or you can do the food journal but it might take a little longer to start the healing. If I were you I'd start with the dairy since you were allergic to it as a baby as well. (if you eat it now--you didn't mention what you do or dint eat already) Good luck!

[kjbrown92]

This article about why we develop food allergies, says that if there is an antigen to milk in you, your BFing child is more likely to develop milk allergy later in life... but I believe it's specifially IgE allergies that it's talking about.