This, I have lots of experience with; After all, my baby girl Marcie, has eczema from two weeks old. Eczema, put simply, is the itch that rashes. It is chronic, meaning it must be managed overtime with no simple cure. Though it is not life threatening, the amount of stress it creates for a mom with a newborn with severe eczema has been researched to show it’s the same as that facing moms taking care of children with severe disabilities. Keeping my baby’s fingers occupied since she could scratch sometimes feel like my full-time job – in the day, I occupy her fingers and at night, I hold her hands when co-sleeping.
Below are the tried and test top five ways of occupying baby’s fingers!
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Learn Sign Language
From 3 months old, I let my baby watch baby sign language DVDs. Of course we all know TV works wonders in distracting babies and the remote control somehow attracts them (mine has been bitten spoilt by my baby). The wonderful thing about learning sign language is that it’s another recognized language that your child can use – I’m planning to volunteer with her when she’s older at the deaf association. Whenever my baby wants to scratch, I’d ask her to sign something ‘milk’, ‘cat’, ‘dog’ and she’d stop her scratching and show me she knows what I’m asking.
Play with anything Cold
I’ve asked a doctor why my baby loves cold teether, cold drinks and she even eats ice! If you’re outside and run out of toys to distract from scratching, buy a small cold bottled drink and let your child play with it. This trick has helped me many times when I’m outdoors with her.
Tear anything you don’t need
I wonder if it motivates me to recycle the magazine pile; babies love tearing paper and your old magazines can help. Be sure that you don’t let your child play with new magazines, not just because it’s new but because it’s easier to get paper-cut.
Chew, but not on anything!
My baby has chewed her buggy book, her stroller fan and even juice cup straw (feels like gummy bears?). The point is get finger food ready, have a teething ring on hand to distract your child. Sometimes, clearly she’s chewing on something inedible, but if you’re trying to keep the stroller from falling off the escalator, I guess a chew at the stroller fan is comparatively safer!
Push something
When your baby can walk, pushing a chair around can occupy her. Getting toys with wheels is also a good distraction.
What is not encouraged to do (though I still do) is saying/shouting ‘Stop Scratching!’ to your child; apparently, it is less effective than rewarding her not to do it. Also, it creates frustration if like me, you have a child with skin problems and really find it hard to control the itch.
Biography
Mei is passionate about helping families with eczema children and her blog, EczemaBlues.com, offers concise posts, eczema cartoons, insightful doctor Q&As to provide parents a light-hearted sanctuary to understand more about childhood eczema. Her baby girl Marcie, who has eczema from two weeks old, has also inspired her to publish a children picture book ‘A to Z Animals are not Scratching!’ that encourages children not to scratch. Mei is active in helping her local community through a support group and an eczema fund to pay for treatment for low income families. You can follow Mei on twitter @MarcieMom.
About The Real Supermum
There brill ideas will have to try that with my little boy because my eldest was a nightmare with scratching her exma xx
Brilliant post!!! I have eczema & had it all my life, I just hope my LO doesn’t have it (as my Mam didn’t get it until she was 47)!!! At least I now know what to do if he does come out in eczema!!? =]
xXxXx
This is a great post and will use it in the future if any of my kids develop it x x
Will deffo be using this if i ever need too
xx
Brilliant post! my daughter (and myself) suffer with eczema quite badley. Im defo one for going ‘dont scratch’ because i have no clue what to do! i’ll be using these tricks more often now. I’ll be making my way over to your blog too shortly! thankyou
xxx
Thank you to everyone for finding the tricks I’ve written useful. Feel free to drop by my blog or chat over twitter if you need more advice/listening ear.
And BIG TU to Emma for having me on your wonderful blog!
This is a brilliant post, I had eczema when I was younger and my mum used to go mad at my itching, at least now if Josh ever suffers with it I’ll know what to do. Thankyou x
luckily my children dont suffer, but alot of children in my family have it bad…. my son didnt even try to sctratch his chicken pox, i was lucky!
Mikayla, I’m so jealous! My baby was scratching and really suffered when she had chickenpox. Here’s what happened to her, miserable and scars everywhere
http://eczemablues.com/2012/01/eczema-meets-chickenpox/
“…has been researched to show it’s the same as that facing moms taking care of children with severe disabilities.”
I’ll pass this on to my mum and dad, they went through hell with me when I was younger.
I think distracting the babes using something cold probably helps as the itching feels like its burning and can make you feel hot and bothered so the cold item will help distract their hands and cool them down a little. Great tips! x
This is a great two of my los have got esama and find it very hard to stop them scratching
This has given me some great ideas, my daughter suffers with eczema although its improving as she gets older. she still finds the itch unbearable at times x
with a husband that has excema and a brother in law they have always scratched! they dont stop.. my oh will scratch until he bleeds i wish their parents had read these tips when they were little! because i think this would really help! x
Thanks everyone for finding this post useful! You can see 10 reasons why parents have it tough in this link http://eczemablues.com/2011/02/10-reasons-why-parents-with-eczema-child-have-a-tougher-time/
Btw stress could be a trigger for eczema, lowers immune system so it’s like double whammy – eczema creates stress and stress triggers eczema!
Both my children have had eczema since birth sp have tried all these tips, if you can occupy a child they will usually stop scratching x
i have tried everything…..it just doesnt work. a film is the best for my lo but other than thst, x x x
Totally understand why parents feel exasperated after trying everything, my 2 cents are 1. seek a child specialist pediatrician in allergy/dermatology/immunology, get allergy test, stick to good moisturizing regime, don’t be afraid to treat the eczema and maybe, don’t try everything – I believe it creates more confusion!
xoxo, have a good weekend
I’ve suffered from excema for as long as I can remember – although it’s managed well now with diet. I think these tips are brilliant for tiny ones – but it’s worth giving some thought to how you’ll amend these tactics over time – my worst scars are from when I was definitely old enough to know better but didn’t know how to cope/manage it.
These are great ideas!
I suffer from Eczema and find myself scratching without even realising it – any tips for me/?x
For adults, lots of moisturizing, just like for babies! It may be habitual for adults, so look for ways to take your mind off the scratching
Thanks for listing me under Inspirational Moms!
My 8 year old daughter suffers from eczema. It is impossible to distract her from the itch, I found a cream that worked really well to stop the itch. I think the trick is preventing the eczema flare ups to start with! Ok there is no cure, but avoiding soap and other irritants has lessened her flare up greatly.!
Yup Julie! I’m moisturizing my baby all the time, keeping fingers crossed it won’t flare!
I have a one year old son who suffered from ezcema I changed his milk from cows milk to goats milk and I have been taking him a bath in St Ives Shea and butter and placing cortisone cream and I have seen improvements in 2 to 3weeks. I was depressed for a whole year and finally I found out the problem was diary products with cows milk are things I need to keep away. If wants cheese goat cheese or goats milk.
Hello!
I have a small blog on Baby Eczema and was researching other medical blogs when I found yours. I just wanted to say that I think it is a great site, well laid out with some excellent articles.
I really liked your all of your blog posts! Now my request from you if you could help me with some ideas on how I can better improve my own and make it easier for people to find articles that are relevant to them.
Thank you for your excellent site!
Derek.
My 5yr old has eczema and sometimes it is really severe. His skin regularly gets so bad it bleeds and gets infected no matter how hard we try to keep him clean….he is a boy after all! We cover him in various creams everyday, have found out what he is allergice too, a very long lost, and have omitted them from his diet. We can distract him from scratching during the day, but nighttime is the worst, as he scratches when he is asleep. Our last resort would be wet wrapping, but he hates anything tight on his skin so I fear this would upset him more. I just hope he grows out of it.