Our Journey to Nourishment

John’s story – by Jean Maclennan

In 1972 Australian soldiers serving in Vietnam were brought home after what has been described by many as a controversial war, and not just for political reasons but also because of methods of warfare, including the use of chemicals such as ‘agent orange’. Robert was one of those soldiers. I am married to his eldest child, Ian. We have a 17 month old son, John. I would like to share his story, which began further back than 17 months ago. This has been our journey so far.

Motherhood is what I consider one of the most important occupations a woman can aspire to. I know this is not a belief shared by everyone, some women do not wish to marry or have children, and others are unable to and I certainly feel for them; but for me, motherhood is something I took very seriously. I never do anything without preparation, and have spent a lot of time with friends who I consider to be great mums, learning from them, gleaning wisdom and ideas and helpful information. I know they say you can never be prepared for parenthood, but I wanted to do my best. I always used to say, when teaching, that if you have to do 5 years at uni to become a teacher there ought to be some kind of training before parenting!

When we married, we planned to both work full-time for a number of years, saving as much of one income as possible and living on the other; then I was going to take leave from my career as a teacher and raise our children on Ian’s income, and return to work when the youngest began school. This was our plan.

However, before our first anniversary ill health had forced me to stop work, not even completing my first year of teaching. Many months of searching for answers led to a diagnosis of Chronic Fatigue Syndrome. Further searching for a ‘cure’ led me to learn a great deal about the importance of diet and nutrition, the detrimental effects of chemicals in the environment and in food, the dangers of our modern ‘convenience’ lifestyle, and the apparent uselessness of conventional drug treatments. I found a natural solution to most aspects of my ill health and understood that many years of using antibiotics and cortisones (for asthma and eczema) had probably also contributed to my condition. Two things I found the most helpful of all were probiotics and organics. I have always found looking at things with an holistic approach the most helpful. I live pretty much by the idea that a symptom should not just be treated but the underlying cause should be found and dealt with.
After years of treating eczema conventionally as a teenager, I found this the only helpful solution as a young adult, and I took this knowledge with me into searching for a solution for my CFS.

Ian had suffered from skin conditions and hyperactivity as a child, in fact we used to joke that if I had taught him I would’ve sent him to doctors for a diagnosis of ADHD. Even younger, he had a number of significant health issues, some requiring surgery, others requiring medication, and along the way some investigation of food allergies or intolerances. He would show significant aggression, and had skin problems, all vaguely attributed to food allergy, possibly to ‘agent orange’, and mostly treated conventionally as opposed to naturally. Most of his symptoms he says he grew out of, but, even though he disagrees with me, I see aspects of them still in his health and his daily life. He seemed to live by the idea that symptoms have treatments and there ends the story, and I know he is not alone in this – this is conventional modern medicine and the way of the western society.

So knowing vaguely that our offspring would probably inherit something ‘bad’ from us, I wanted to embark on the journey of parenthood with a degree of caution. My favourite motto in life is “If in doubt, don’t” and as there is so much doubt surrounding so many things to do with how we live our lives in the western world today, my leaning towards natural and organic methods was strong. I knew about things in accepted research, such as the statistics on obesity in children being to do with maternal weight problems before and during pregnancy and even being linked with the weight of the father, so our first goal was to lose weight as we were both quite overweight. I figured if this could affect children, many other things probably could too. I was always curious about the idea of diet changing the likelihood of conceiving either a boy or a girl too. I’d heard so many things over the years, but the main thing was our weight, so we achieved our weight goals, and before
trying to conceive we tried to eat healthy, including as much organics as possible. I am a firm believer in the benefits of eating organic foods, and years ago wished that throughout pregnancy and lactation that I could eaten a perfectly organic diet and have what I called an ‘organic baby’, but as everyone knows this is not easy or generally affordable. So I did my best.

Once pregnant and throughout pregnancy I tried to eat well (which in itself is controversial whether the mother’s diet significantly affects the growing baby, and even defining a ‘healthy’ diet is a matter of contention) but weeks of feeling off food followed by craving some of the worst foods (most notably drive-thru takeaway) had me departing from my ‘healthy’ plan. People said to me I should eat whatever I felt like, as cravings often have to do with the baby’s needs. So whilst I never ‘ate for two’ I did give in to some of the cravings whilst maintaining a predominantly healthy diet. During the pregnancy I had mostly good health, except at one stage we both got a terrible case of bronchitis (which I’ve always been very susceptible to) and ended up on antibiotics, which I wasn’t happy about, but I was more worried about the bruised ribs and all the coughing hurting the baby and was assured the drugs were fine during pregnancy.

I wanted to have a natural birth and I planned to breastfeed as I knew of the benefits of these for both mum and particularly baby. The hospital we were booked into had a wonderful childbirth unit, we attended antenatal classes there and I had ‘shared care’ (midwifery) during my pregnancy. I had a fear that a long and difficult labour might cause a relapse of my CFS (as there is much research pointing to this) and discussed this, as well as issues to do with inducing labour and other things I was concerned about, with both my doctor and the midwives. I was convinced we were in the best of care, and we were… until my baby went past 2 weeks overdue and was still head high and a caesarean was called for.

The caesarean itself was not a problem and I recovered well with no major complications, but I was a bit shocked at how extremely clinical it was, and how far removed from the lovely model of natural birth the hospital had taught in the classes. John entered the world just after 2pm (officially at 42 weeks 3 days gestation) and was immediately cleaned, the cord cut, and whisked away. The surgeon’s comment was “I wouldn’t have let you go this long” but the nurse’s comment was “John doesn’t look overcooked, he looks great” so I wasn’t too worried. I had hoped to hold him as I was awake and mobile from the chest up, but in case that wasn’t possible Ian had worn a buttoned shirt as the classes had talked about the importance of skin-to-skin contact. As I lay in theatre and recovery, John was put in the humidicrib, then given wrapped to Ian, and they returned to our room to wait for me; the nurses disappeared, there was no mention of skin-to-skin or anything. Ian
was a little bewildered, but thankfully my parents arrived to keep him company and meet their first grandchild. I was in recovery for ages, my breathing was extremely laboured to the point I almost stopped breathing, I remember lying there and thinking it would be so easy just to stop breathing but the will to live and to look after my baby was thankfully stronger. I called out to a nurse that I couldn’t breathe, and they put me on oxygen and she sat with me until I was ready to return to our room.

John’s first breastfeed was difficult but I was determined so when he was about 3 hours old, the midwife helped me with feeding; and I had help throughout our 6-day stay. I did wonder about the possible adverse affects of various things that happened, for example the midwives in antenatal class had talked about the skin-to-skin and not cleaning the vernix off the baby straight away, and I thought if it was important enough for them to mention it there must be some research that’s gone into why, and yet John was cleaned straight away and had no skin-to-skin for 3 hours (and even then only briefly for our first feed) but I told myself not to be concerned; and actually as a new mum I found I didn’t have much choice, being a new mum is demanding enough without thinking about this sort of thing too much. Even the fact that John lost too much weight in his first days didn’t worry me, they said it was common and we’d be fine.

I booked into the lactation day stay (LDS) before leaving hospital. It wasn’t easy at home without help, I had been sent home following severe breast engorgement and was developing nipple grazes. I was using a pump and expressing and feeding via syringe or bottle. After a day or two I was haunted by the weight he’d lost and was worried he wasn’t getting enough from me. We had confusing, conflicting, and distressing advice from some of the home visit nurses and the maternal and child health (M&CH) nurses; I had joined the Australian Breastfeeding Association (ABA) and got valuable information from them; I found the best help was from a couple of friends of mine who ‘coached’ me through the early days with much encouragement, as well as coming over to do my washing and cleaning for me. They also knew my leanings to natural and old-fashioned ways of doing things, for example the particular brand of washing liquid I used and the wet-dust cleaning, and I really appreciated
that they respected this. So things settled into a sort of rhythm of feeding, playing and sleeping with John’s routine.

But by day 9 my milk was dry, and I was devastated. We stumbled painfully through the first feed of the morning and made it to LDS but I took along a tin of organic formula I’d bought before having him ‘just in case’ (believing it was better to be prepared than not) and thought they’d have to show me what to do with it. Thankfully, at LDS we got started again. My brag at the time was what the lactation consultant (LC) said to me, that if all mothers had my determination there’d be a 100% breastfeeding rate. I knew about things such as the World Health Organisation’s recommendation to breastfeed to age 2, and had spent time with a friend who was breastfeeding a newborn, getting her to show me how it was done; I was applauded for this as well as my determination. I had severe nipple damage, 3rd degree fissures, and was sent home with ‘mexican hats’ (nipple shields) and booked in again two weeks later.

In terms of feeding and attachment, we never looked back, although I kept using the mexican hats for a long time, and I’m thankful we never had issues with mastitis or thrush; but on our return to LDS I was wondering about my diet as I’d heard what you eat can impact on baby, my mother had advised me to avoid onion, cabbage and broccoli. I was told by the LC that not much affected the baby and I should eat whatever I’d eaten during pregnancy, whatever I considered healthy. A friend of mine was at LDS with me, she is from India where her father is a doctor, she told me she planned to avoid certain foods, just as my mother mentioned, that can cause wind problems and stick with their traditional diet for lactation, handed down over generations. The LC said that was fine but unnecessary; but I continued questioning further about being concerned about our family history and health problems. She assured me again that nothing would affect the baby and I could eat whatever I
liked. So I took the LC at her word and ate the free lunch they provided… and ate… and ate. I stuck with organics as much as possible, but as my son was now draining my body efficiently I was finding my appetite hugely increased and yet the kilos continued to fall off me. Other mums I knew were a bit jealous of me being able to ‘have my cake and eat it too’ literally, I ate so much ‘fattening’ food on top of my healthy and mostly organic diet, and yet got thinner and thinner. Even now after breastfeeding for 14 months and having weaned 3 months ago, I’m still very thin. So I was living a dream… little did I know that this dream wasn’t just about to turn into a nightmare, unbeknown to me it was actually a nightmare waiting to happen. A ticking time-bomb, a mine hidden well by leaf litter.

I breastfed John exclusively for 6 months. In that time, he became a really chubby baby. He had terrible skin (I was told it was ‘hormonal acne’) at 1 month of age which gradually got better, but receded into cradle cap that never cleared up, and occasional skin rashes, and quite a bit of trouble with wind and tummy aches although I would never have described him as ‘colicky’ and I knew of babies that had worse problems with it. But basically we were advised he was ‘normal’ and ‘healthy’ and not to worry at all. He had conjunctivitis a few times, and I squirted my milk into his eyes and it cleared up… I was told breastmilk is the ‘original wonderdrug’ of nature and used it for all sorts of things including the cradle cap! I sought advice from our local nurse, who really respected my natural leaning, and from the LCs regularly, and different suggestions were made about his tummy problems. I did end up using gripe water at one stage (against my ‘better
judgement’ so to speak but nothing else was working and he wasn’t sleeping well that week and I was exhausted) and then an LC suggested ‘lactose intolerance’ for which the advice was to skim 30ml each side first thing in the morning – this seemed to help a little, and I used the extra milk on his cradle cap or in his bath.

So I basically didn’t worry about John at all much. I was actually more concerned about me, my hair fell out at an alarming rate, I was thin, then I was diagnosed with postnatal depression when he was 5 months, and I looked terrible. I had been warned that mothers often forget to look after themselves, and I’d tried to look after myself, but now I was worried I was getting CFS back. Regular counseling with a specialist M&CH nurse helped greatly and I felt like I was getting back on track. During this time one other thing concerned me greatly, I developed a terrible rash on my breasts, I think it was an allergic reaction to the disposable breast pads I’d been using, so I threw them out and started using washable ones (which I washed with his clothes in my particular brand of washing liquid) but it just wouldn’t go away. I even tried washing my breasts with my own milk! The doctor wanted to prescribe cortisone but I said no – that had never worked on my eczema, and I
was worried about it getting into the bloodstream and my milk. She assured me I had nothing to worry about, but I insisted. I was given a non-cortisone alternative, which was 5 times the price, but which cleared it up. I read the leaflet that came with it, which said that it was ‘safe’ for use during pregnancy/lactation, but some other statements indicated perhaps the research or testing was incomplete or inconclusive… ah well it wasn’t a cortisone and that was my main concern.

With the difficult start to breastfeeding fresh in my mind, but also the WHO guidelines and encouragement from the ABA, in the early days I took breastfeeding a week at a time, then a month at a time, then I began to aim for specific events such as first tooth (and thought if he bit I might stop) and basically this was my plan, just to continue and aim for goals along the way. Teeth didn’t eventuate so we got to 6 months no worries. After that I decided I would aim for 9 months… 12 months… maybe I would make it to the desirable 2 years? And I was convinced of the benefits for John – some of the kids the same age as him who were formula-fed had a terrible winter with severe gastro, coughs and colds, two babies in our mums group even ended up in hospital on drips. Ian and I both had a 2-day gastro at one stage, but John had one runny nappy and that was it.

Then it was time for solids. I figured that if allergies were such a concern in this day and age (a number of mums in my mums group had children with allergies, already supplementing with soy formulas or using cortisones) there would be guidelines about introducing foods. My first stop, when John was 5 months (planning ahead as usual!) was the WHO website, then I asked the LCs, I asked our health nurse, and I researched on the internet sites for parents, but other than obvious things like avoiding particular foods for choking reasons, and being careful of the 6 ‘standard’ allergy foods (wheat/milk/etc) there wasn’t much information. I expected a list of what order to introduce foods in, what quantities, that kind of thing. I knew, gut instinct, that there should be this sort of information, but I couldn’t find it. So we launched into solids a little blindly, and I kept meticulous records of what he had and how much, and I thought at least it was all organic, I knew that
much was good. I was glad I had a microwave, as we did the ‘cook in bulk, freeze in ice cubes’ thing; I refused to heat food in plastic (as I’d read somewhere that the plastic can leach into the food when microwaving) and bought little ceramic dishes for feeding him. Thankfully John loved his food as much as he loved his milk (if not more!) and was as excellent an eater as he had become a feeder. But within a month he had started getting a bit of eczema and just didn’t seem himself, even his sleep patterns changed. Most people put it down to teething symptoms. So I waited for teeth, and wondered if I would have to stop breastfeeding fairly soon afterwards if he started biting.

But although teeth didn’t appear, the eczema continued to and I couldn’t work out that it was related to foods, I was following the advice to introduce new foods no quicker than 3-4 days, and being familiar with food challenges on elimination diets I couldn’t see any obvious patterns. I was more concerned about his iron levels, as I’d read that after 6 months they need solids because they don’t get enough from breastmilk. When I’d had eczema treated by a naturopath, iron was one of the things she said I needed, as well as calcium, and the ‘cofactor’ vitamins to aid absorption; so in my logic transferring this to John, he needed solids, so I kept at it. I wanted to avoid pharmaceuticals and so found natural alternatives such as moisturizing creams, oils in the bath, even a ‘milk and honey’ product (which was wonderful but expensive) but most of the moisturizers and oils made him worse, so I stuck with the honey products as they seemed to help the most.

At 8 months I was getting worried as nothing topical cleared it up, so we found a naturopath. I’d been feeding him some bought jarred food – a reputable organic brand – as we were preparing to move house so I knew my time preparing and cooking food was going to be limited. The naturopath immediately suggested taking wheat and diary out of his diet, and putting him on a children’s probiotic. I thought we’d hit on the answer… John had been having wheat cereal and organic formula for breakfast for a couple of weeks. We got improvement. Then it got worse. Salicylates were suggested, particularly the jarred food which had tomatoes in them, and again I thought we’d hit on an answer. We got improvement. Then it got worse. Our naturopath was encouraging of me continuing breastfeeding (in fact at our first appointment he assumed I wasn’t breastfeeding and followed a line of questioning on the assumption that this was a possible cause of the trouble, until I realized
his confusion – you should’ve seen his face when I said John had no formula! – and when I said he was breastfed he was visibly relieved) but didn’t suggest me avoiding these foods as the eczema had only appeared at 7 months, so it seemed logical that it was solids causing the problems. This also seemed logical as a mum in my mums group who had a child with severe eczema had been seeing a naturopath who told her to change her diet, but her child had eczema from birth so it seemed unnecessary for me. So I continued eating everything as normal. We heard sesame oil and the essential fatty acid oils (evening primrose, flaxseed) could help eczema so I began making a mixture of equal parts of sesame, olive and evening primrose oil to put on him after his baths, and added flaxseed oil to one dish of food per day. We got a little improvement, then it got worse again. But with moving house and other stresses at the time, I was unable to do anything else, so we just did our best
to stop him itching when he was awake, but it was hard. In the process of moving I lost one of my nipple shields; then John threw a tantrum about using them anyway, so I put up with a few days of discomfort until we both settled down to feeding without them.

At 10 months we saw a new health nurse who was also an LC. I questioned her about all my concerns, particularly dietary, but also how to treat him. John was playing happily on the floor and I was in tears. She said, commandingly, condescendingly, to stop crying and look at my son, he was happy and healthy and we would be OK; but I could take him to an allergist at the hospital. She was more concerned about how I was feeding him than what I was feeding him, she wanted him self-feeding, but as all of his foods were purees still, I just couldn’t do it and maintain my sanity, I tried it once and he ate so little, most of it was on the floor. I was more concerned about getting food into his mouth. We didn’t see her again.

I contacted the hospital, but the waiting list at the hospital was 12 months… so we continued trying various treatments (everything except cortisones) with some improvements but mostly deterioration. He was covered from head to toe with rash, except his nappy area, and that made me think about the moisture and the honey healing the skin. I wondered if he had some kind of bacterial infection (I’d had quite a bad one under a fingernail which I’d treated with dettol cream) and knew that not long ago they started selling ‘medi-honey’ as an alternative to dettol/savlon-type products, so I began covering him from head to toe in the honey nappy butter we’d been using. Again, this helped a lot, but it was expensive. We also realized I’d always reacted to chlorine, and when we’d moved house we’d started buying cheaper nappies, so I returned to the more expensive chlorine-free nappies he’d worn for the first 6 months of his life. Again, some improvement, but not the
answer. I then got on the website of the hospital which were on the waiting list for, and read about wet dressings. This also made sense, if the nappy area is moist and eczema-free it could be the constant moisture. But I knew how constant moisture makes my skin crawl so I didn’t try the full method. I bought the recommended petroleum products (again something I’d tried to avoid from birth as I’d read stuff about the possible effects of overuse) and caked him with the goop under his pyjamas every night. It did nothing at all, except ruin his clothes. We tried quite a few conventional things, bath oils, skin moisturizers, and at best they did nothing, at worst they made him scream stinging his skin and he would scream until we put him in the bath and washed it off. I wasn’t surprised by this, they made the skin on my hands crawl as well. And as the same information also said about overheating being a problem, we realized we’d been overheating him terribly all winter,
I felt really guilty. I wondered if the hot baths I’d had when I was pregnant (much hotter than recommended) could be implicated? And then what could we do with summer coming? It had to be jumpsuits, or tie him up by the wrists (which I’d also heard of) and it was awful to think this might happen. I hadn’t used very many synthetic items of clothing at all, but now I got rid of everything that was synthetic, bed sheets, jumpsuits, the lot. Everything was cotton. I knew there are lots of organic cotton clothes available but really couldn’t afford to replace his clothes. So I bought more cotton jumpsuits, 2 sizes too big, sewed them all inside out to stop the seams irritating him, and he lived in these. It was around this time that his first tooth appeared. A bit of biting while feeding followed, but because he was unwell I wanted to keep feeding, so I tried to teach him not to bite. I thought I might have to get out the nipple shields again, but thankfully he got the
idea and stopped biting.

At 11 months he was out of control. He was whingy, constantly scratching, and absolutely nothing was working, natural or conventional treatments. At this stage, the only thing I hadn’t used was cortisones. Everyone who knew us took pity on us. Concerned people suggested I stop breastfeeding as I was so drained physically as well as emotionally – but I couldn’t and wouldn’t. Through a neighbour, we got an urgent appointment with her daughter’s paediatric dermatologist, who did a skin prick test and diagnosed egg allergy. But John had never eaten anything with egg, not even biscuits or cakes, not even a taste. Just as well, said the doctor, as he may be anaphylactic to egg. My fear rose… this was serious! We’d had training on epi-pens at work years ago. The doctor explained to me about the treatment of eczema (and inwardly I was rolling my eyes as I’d heard it all before when I was a teenager) and prescribed a strong cortisone. It just didn’t seem right to
me. John has an allergy to something he’s never eaten, so what is causing his eczema and what has given him this allergy? And what about the dairy and wheat the naturopath had suggested we avoid, this test showed he didn’t have that allergy? I asked should I stop eating egg (as I had recently started making quiche occasionally, and had been eating crumbed foods or bacon and eggs all along) and would this cure him? I was told no. Stop eating egg by all means if I wanted to, but the only hope we had was the drugs. I smiled at the doctor and said “You don’t know me very well, there’s no way I’m using a drug like that without trying a natural method first”. So I left, and took egg out of my diet. Massive improvement. And it lasted longer than previous improvements too. But eventually it got worse – looking back now I realise it was because I re-introduced a bit of wheat and dairy because the test said he wasn’t allergic to them. And I started thinking there
was probably more in my diet that he was reacting to, but had no idea where to start. By this time I was so worn out, confused, and upset, that I just felt like it was all too hard. But there was no way I was using cortisones. I was ridiculed for this by some people, but I just couldn’t bring myself to do it. One friend, a nurse, told me that cortisone is produced naturally by the body, so all the creams do is ‘help’ where the body isn’t producing enough. I couldn’t agree with that at all. To start with, the body wouldn’t need to produce so much of it if the problem was removed. Secondly cortisone produced in a lab isn’t natural so how could it be the same as your body’s? And I’d read putting it on the skin does two things, it suppresses the symptoms (I’d seen this in myself, using these creams on my hands for years, my skin cleared but my fingernails started growing looking like they had pock marks, when I stopped using the creams my skin got eczema but
my fingernails grew normally) and it can create a dependence on the cream, sometimes making the body stop bothering to produce it’s own natural cortisones. If it suppresses symptoms, how are you supposed to know there’s something wrong? I believe symptoms point to a problem, and the problem must be dealt with. And if it stops the body doing what comes naturally, isn’t that as bad as drug addiction? And finally, why didn’t the body produce enough, how do you help the body to produce more of it naturally, is it a nutritional deficiency? I wasn’t happy about this at all.

By John’s 1st birthday he was covered in red, dry, itchy skin from head to toe. The only part without eczema was his nappy area, but even his bottom cheeks were starting to get some, and the only thing we could do was dress him in the inside-out full-body jump-suits with the legs sewn up to the crotch. If he ever wore normal clothes, the legs were tucked into socks. He just itched and itched and itched. We got so tired of saying “Don’t itch” and I started really losing my temper sometimes, which was so unfair, he wasn’t being naughty and losing my temper wouldn’t help even if he was. I felt terrible. We got really good at ‘managing’ him and ‘hiding’ our stress from people in social settings. I wondered if there was something that would take away the itch, and started investigating other types of reactions than allergy, and came across terms such as IgG and IgA but really couldn’t understand it… actually I couldn’t cope with much at this stage,
personal stresses and now sleep deprivation (the itching was now waking him throughout the night) and the overwhelming feeling of the whole situation were really taking their toll on me, on all of us really; but I knew kids who were worse off and was actually inspired by them and their courageous parents to continue on the path we were on. My husband was mostly supportive, and only occasionally suggested we give up and use the cortisones. I guess you could say I was using the ‘policy of containment’ in this war. But that was about to change.

Away on holidays over Christmas he really got worse. Family we were staying with suggested I stop breastfeeding, as by this time I was convinced it was my diet that was the problem. My step-mother said she had had to stop breastfeeding my half-sister because she was ‘allergic’ to her and it was possible this ran in the family from our father’s side… but I just couldn’t, I knew there were too many benefits for him in terms of health protection and immunity, and I was also scared for me as I hadn’t really had major fatigue since having John and my own doctor had said that the pregnancy/lactation hormones were beneficial for me. A friend we stayed with gave me Sue Dengate’s “Failsafe Cookbook” and “Fed Up With Food Additives” but unfortunately for me I was familiar with these books from my teaching years, parents I knew had talked about them and how they helped their kids hyperactivity, so I glanced over the books but basically dismissed them as nothing John
ate had additives in it. But around the same time I’d made the connection (incorrect or not, I still don’t know) that if he was allergic to egg that he might be also reacting to foods that had egg-like ingredients. I knew egg is an emulsifier, and knew many things I ate had emulsifiers in them, so using the additive list, I started avoiding the emulsifier numbers in foods.

It was so hard being away on holidays because family and friends were having us stay and I wasn’t able to control everything I ate, but I did my best. However, John just got worse and worse. We found one moisturizing cream which helped a little, and we found the humid climate where we were holidaying helped a little. We took John for his first swim in the ocean water too, and the salty water seemed to help a bit. But weeks of travelling, trying to stop him itching while in the car, not letting him out of our sight for fear of him touching foods with egg in them (still not knowing if he might be anaphylactic) and constantly saying “Don’t itch” wore very thin. We got to my mum’s place. Mum was really concerned, of course, and although supportive of my efforts with organics (she’d even travelled 35km to buy organic foods for John to eat) she said we’d better give in and get the prescription filled. I was furious, and distraught, but gave in. Ian was relieved. I
felt physically ill putting even the over-the-counter mild cortisone on him (it was all we could get as the prescription was at home) and not just because of my thoughts or beliefs about the stuff, but also because the smell of the cream reminded me of the years I had plastered my own skin with it, so it was an association memory, and on top of that because I could feel the cream stinging my own hands as I spread it all over him. But, of course, it worked. Ian and mum were nearly in tears with relief that the ‘battle’ was ‘over’. And whilst I enjoyed our first night of complete sleep for months, I knew the ‘battle’ in this war had actually just begun. I may have given in, but I hadn’t given up.

When we got home I did more research about the food additive connection. I got hold of the “Failsafe Cookbook” again and read it more carefully, and it was there that I read what seemed like an autobiography of our journey; on one page she described babies who have ‘nothing wrong with them’ until solids are introduced. It finally clicked, it wasn’t just the egg I ate, it was all the other stuff on top of the healthy stuff that I was eating. I immediately remembered my wish, way back before conceiving, to have an ‘organic baby’ and felt so guilty and so devastated, yet strangely vindicated… perhaps my vague wish hadn’t been so silly after all.

I knew so little, but I knew when I’d been diagnosed with food intolerances years ago that eating organic had helped me (for example, I was supposedly wheat intolerant, but switching to organic bread and pasta solved the problem; I drew the conclusion that it was possible to be intolerant or allergic to the chemicals or the processing and not the food, and my doctor at the time had agreed) so when we got home I tried a little ‘science experiment’ of my own. I went out and bought two weeks worth of food just for John and I (we couldn’t afford it for the whole family, and Ian was skeptical anyway, he thinks the organic industry is a ‘take’ at worst, and at best an expense we don’t need) so for two weeks I didn’t touch food unless it was egg-free, additive-free, and organic. I had no idea what would happen. I figured either everything would be fixed, or nothing would happen at all. Either way, I would have to give up breastfeeding: if it fixed everything, the
solution was unaffordable; if it fixed nothing, we knew now that it was ‘something’ in my milk causing the problem and we couldn’t find a solution to that one. Nothing could have prepared me for what actually happened.

For 4 days, John got worse and worse. It wasn’t just his skin, it was also his behaviour. It was more than the frustration of itching which we had seen up until now, the frustration that we could sympathise with or the behaviour we could put down to ‘teething’; this was defiance and mischievousness and tantrums… it was like another child. I’d seen this with school-age children, but never a 1 year old baby! And I felt like I had CFS and PND and had been run over by a truck all at once. I almost gave up; one day I almost took both of us to hospital, I was afraid I was going to hurt one of us, things got so bad. Words cannot describe what happened. I can’t even try to give an accurate picture. The example I give most often is that one day I lost my temper at Ian for nothing and threw a plate of food at him. He looked stunned, came over to me, held me by the shoulders and shouted “What is wrong with you?!” to which I responded “I don’t know!” and collapsed
in a blithering heap on the floor. We had a doctor’s appointment that day. The doctor wrote a referral to the hospital for John, as well as a referral to a psychologist for me. I couldn’t believe we were in such a mess.

I was desperate for help, I rang the hospital to ask them how we would know they had got the referral, and they explained that a triage nurse takes all referrals and makes appointments accordingly, and we would receive a letter with an appointment date. I waited in the worst state of despair I have ever experienced in my life, and that’s saying something as I’d experienced significant times of despair – death of a parent, a broken engagement – they were nothing compared to this.

But suddenly, and it was literally overnight, on day 5 of our organic experiment I woke having had a whole night’s sleep and feeling better than I have ever felt in my life, and I’m not exaggerating. I was amazed John hadn’t woken once through the night, and when he did wake and I went to him, his skin was not itchy and red. It was only a little blotchy, like he had rouge brushed on him. It was like waking from a nightmare. I almost couldn’t believe it. This was too good to be true. It was like a healing miracle.

It was bliss for over a week. He continued to get better. I even ate, without realizing until later, an organic biscuit that had egg in it – I’d bought organic shortbread and knowing the traditional recipe doesn’t have egg I didn’t bother checking the ingredients until I threw out the empty box. There had been no problems for John at all.

I found explanation for what had happened – withdrawal symptoms, like going cold turkey from heroin addiction. We were chatting at dinner one night about this, and my dad particularly wondered about a connection to our society’s drug addiction problems, was it possible that early exposure and ‘addiction’ to food additives and chemicals was behind it? Again, it seemed logical. If aspirin was pure salicylates as the book said, and people had used aspirin without knowing they had an intolerance, did it get their body ‘addicted’ to the effects? The theory of intolerance and withdrawal which we had experienced was so obvious, and the book also talked about how often the very foods we crave and eat the most are the likely ‘addictions’. There are so many questions that beg answers… but my focus now was the decision facing me: keep eating this expensive, pure diet and breastfeed; or wean and find alternatives for John that we could afford. In the end my desperation,
being completely worn out mentally and physically by this journey, and our financial situation won over my better judgement. So on Australia Day weekend John had his last mummy milk.

I knew any mother who likes to breastfeed feels a sense of grief when finishing… so in a sense I was prepared for that, but this was worse. It was like the decision had been ‘forced’ on me by circumstances that I either understood and couldn’t control (like finances and an imperfect world) or that I just didn’t understand at all (like allergy and intolerance and how they are caused and how they work and how they are treated). But I also know that any mother will do what is best for her child over what she needs or feels or wants, and this is what I believed I was doing. I just hoped that removing the ‘whatever it was’ in my milk and keeping him on an organic diet would be enough.

It wasn’t. I wish I could tell you he hasn’t looked back; things actually have become more complicated.

That first day, after his final feed in the morning, we asked a friend to come over and baby sit. I knew if I was around him like I usually was I would want to feed him and I wasn’t sure I could overcome this without distracting both him and me. So Ian and I went out for the day and enjoyed some time together; and as a bit of ‘reverse psychology’ on myself I ate take away all day so my milk would be ‘bad’ for him. The next morning, his first morning without a feed, we got up before him and got dressed ready to go out for breakfast and he was distracted by being out in a restaurant for breakfast (at which I ate an omelette for the same ‘reverse psychology’ reason). My diet went back to being ‘whatever whenever’ after that. If my symptoms of depression and ill-health returned because I wasn’t on an organic diet that was too bad – I am an adult, I can do a lot to get help or use treatments if necessary. But my focus had to be his diet now.

Concerned about calcium, I continued giving him yoghurt as he had been having for a while; then one day introduced cheese and cows milk. He hadn’t tested on the skin prick test as having a dairy allergy, and he’d had a little bit of formula or milk on his breakfast, so I was quite confident he wouldn’t have a problem with drinking it in a cup, and he was so well now that I thought he’d be right with just about anything I gave him. There was no reaction to the cheese which I gave him first, and he loved it, so then a few minutes later I gave him the milk in a sipper cup – moments after the milk he broke out in hives. I’d never seen this happen before. I didn’t know if it was the cheese (completely new food) or the milk (in quantity). I wasn’t overly concerned, his breathing was fine and the lumps looked like what I used to get when I touched a cat, so I knew it was just a simple allergic reaction, but I took him to our local hospital just in case. By the time we
saw a doctor the reaction had mostly gone (which was about an hour) and she told me if it happened again I could give him something (I think it was an antihistamine) but I said other than the skin reaction which went away of its own accord, was that necessary? She said it wasn’t, and so long as I watched him carefully we could monitor his reactions without major concern. I preferred not to use drugs so didn’t take what they offered me.

It made me wonder though, if he’d tested negative and had this kind of reaction, what would he be like if he did come into contact with egg? The dread of this happening, the fear, returned in a rush and for weeks I hated taking him anywhere. And I didn’t want to introduce any other foods either. I was so worried. I called the paediatric dermatologist we’d seen, and he was stumped, and vaguely apologetic, and on further questioning from me said that sometimes the tests aren’t accurate and he would need to be retested. I couldn’t afford the fees, I’d only just managed to pay him for the tests months earlier. He said we’d have to go to the hospital allergy clinic; and I wanted to see a dietician too. Shortly afterwards we were informed that we had an appointment at the allergy clinic in only 6 weeks time. So much for the 12 month waiting list, I guess they thought it was urgent enough, and I was relieved. I was glad in a way that our doctor had seen us in such a
bad state and worded his letter the way he had, obviously they had ‘triaged’ the letter as urgent. So I rang the hospital and thanked them for the appointment, but also asked could we see a dietician on the same day. They said it was unlikely this would be necessary, but if after the appointment they considered it otherwise, we would be referred to their nutrition department. So not content with this, I rang the nutrition department, who gave me a little advice over the phone but basically said to follow their protocol. So I waited, and just kept doing what we were doing, which was learning about the possibilities of other things in his diet being a problem. I also wondered if things he was lacking in his diet could be implicated, as he was now off breastmilk. I continued with what the naturopath had suggested, and the “Failsafe Cookbook” said, about salicylates, and started taking them out of John’s diet more. There was a marked improvement. But still not a cure,
and he was losing weight and was starving hungry all the time, he was constantly asking me for food (he signs so I knew what he was asking for – milk, biscuits, food, more – and he signed these almost every waking moment, and it broke my heart every time he signed milk, it was the first sign he had learnt, he started using it at 6 months, but had only recently understood he could use it to request mummy milk… and now I couldn’t give it to him). He was eating massive bowls of food, whatever I could give him. The appointment letter had requested we see our M&CH nurse to update his records (height/weight/etc.) and I was shocked that my healthy chubby baby who was over 10kg before he was a year old, had now dropped, at 15 months, to 9.7kg.

I wondered where on earth does a sensitivity or intolerance to salicylates come from? We are told eating fruit and vegetables is good for you – 5 and 2! This just didn’t make sense to me at all. Again, I turned to organics as being better – perhaps it wasn’t salicylates at all, perhaps it was the chemicals, as I had found for myself with the so-called wheat intolerance. I read that salicylates are the natural pesticide under the skin… it seemed logical to me that the same rule could apply, perhaps it was the pesticides infiltrating the conventional fruits and vegetables and not a natural food chemical at all? But then I was told that natural salicylates are higher in organics, just as nutritional value and taste are also higher. Oh. Then I wondered if the exposure to things high in salicylates early on could have caused the problem. My mum had questioned the organic baby products we purchased, bath oils, massage oils, etc. that had all been okayed by the nurses in
hospital; I’d long thought you shouldn’t put anything on your skin that you wouldn’t eat and these were all natural or ‘edible’ but perhaps they had sensitized him to salicylates? And what about the honey butter we’d used all over him when he got eczema? What about pregnancy – the hot baths? The organic earl grey tea with oil of bergamot I’d had once a day instead of the umpteen decaf teas all my pregnant friends were having? The fried foods and take away? The organic ‘belly oil’ I’d rubbed on my swelling abdomen? It seemed an endless line of questioning so I gave up researching that one, although it kept me awake at night sometimes. The other thing that didn’t make sense to me about the salicylates theory was the heavy peeling recommended. I’d grown up knowing that the best nutrients are just under the skin! When I started eating organic fruits and vegetables years ago, I’d stopped peeling things altogether – I’m a lazy cook and hate tedious
food preparation and was told all organics needed was to remove dirt in the case of things such as potatoes and anything not visually appealing, such as root strings on carrots. Yet again, I’d done something ‘wrong’ according to this new theory. I felt quite hopeless – how is it possible to ever find out what is ‘best’ for any of us?

I joined the internet forum “failsafebaby” and found so many mothers with similar, and often worse, stories than mine, and we shared ideas and knowledge about allergies, intolerances, treatments, all sorts of things, in particular we had on the forum a couple of knowledgeable people, a naturopath, a nurse, a paediatric nurse, a dietician, so it’s not just a bunch of mums inventing more old wives tales, we are learning a lot. After joining this group and meeting mums who have their children (and themselves in the case of lactation) on extremely restricted diets reminded me of a child I had taught years ago, he was in grade 5 at school and his diet consisted of bananas, two varieties of potato available seasonally, pears (also seasonal), rice, sunflower oil, and salt. This was obviously a severe example, but I now learn not isolated. This scared me… what would it take to heal John?

The allergy tests were done and showed a huge reaction to egg, a smaller reaction to dairy, and an even smaller reaction to wheat, as well as a dust mite allergy. Implementing the dust mite recommendations was easy. But I wasn’t happy about the test only showing a few foods when I knew it was more complicated than that, and asked for that referral to the dietician. I wondered how it was that the test before Christmas hadn’t showed these other allergies, and was told they are inaccurate at younger ages, and get more accurate with the age of the child. So useful, I cynically thought to myself. So now it was to be dairy- and wheat-free as well. And I wondered what damage had been done to his insides by giving him dairy and wheat until now. I started to wonder if all this intolerance and allergy stuff had more to do with the condition of the body, particularly the gastro-intestinal system, and not so much to do with the individual foods.

A few weeks later the dietician made a number of suggestions, especially because of the weight loss, and 3 serves of soy (milk or cheese or yoghurt) was recommended. I took this advice unhappily as I’d heard soy was not a good idea especially for boys. She assured me it was ok to consume soy products after the age of 12 months and with a varied diet. I had no choice, so went home and gave him 3 soy milk drinks a day. I didn’t give him cheese as even the organic versions of these had ‘numbers’ and I wasn’t keen about introducing them. I had to order organic soy yoghurt and found the same… so reluctantly gave him the yoghurt over a week, not wanting to waste it. But he started to chub up quite quickly, so I found rice and oat milk which had calcium and iron, and just kept him on one soy drink a day. Some of the other suggestions were corn crackers, corn chips, peanut butter spread, but as corn is a ‘medium’ on the salicylates list I delayed this. Peanuts are
‘high’ but as raw cashews (not roasted) are low I thought we’d try cashew spread. I checked with the dietician and she said that was a great substitute. So I bought a jar of organic unroasted cashew spread.

All hell broke lose the day after I gave him the cashew spread. His skin broke out, his behaviour went bad, and his sleep – well the first night he didn’t sleep well and we were up to him twice, but on the second night he didn’t sleep at all unless he was in my arms in the rocking chair. Which may seem normal to some parents but I had never had to do this with John, not even as a tiny baby. He was writhing in pain and screaming unless I restrained him. I was shocked. Later that week I was talking to my friend who comes from India, she couldn’t believe the dietician had recommended nuts of any kind, in their traditional diet they don’t use them until at minimum 2 and sometimes 5 years of age, depending on the nut, and she explained about other foods they also avoid giving their children or lactating mothers. It was very interesting to me, so I started to research about traditional diets a little… and followed less of the dietician’s recommendations.

But my main focus was getting John well, which happened to some extent. Corn chips a couple of weeks later set us back for a few days. And a biscuit he picked up at playgroup another day also set us back. Then I discovered the probiotic (which he’d been on since we first went to a naturopath) had a non-dairy version, which pointed to the one we’d been using as possibly containing dairy. I checked with the chemist… sure enough, it did. I took him off it and replaced it with the dairy-free version. Massive improvement. But then I got mad at the naturopath, although he was the one to originally suggest salicylates and suggest removing wheat and dairy, he hadn’t known my breastmilk could be harmful and had put us on a dairy-based probiotic… yet another practitioner who I felt had let us down.

At almost 17 months he weighed 11.2kg and resembled his happy healthy self. The dietician had suggested when he was ‘well’ again that we do a wheat challenge to see if the minor reaction in the skin prick test was very serious. So for two days he had a wheat cereal for breakfast. He was awful. Nothing on the face when he ate it, but his skin flared up terribly and so did his behaviour again. I despaired of finding something to fix him, and again feared him coming into contact with milk and egg, or anything else he may have since developed an allergy to that we may not know about. I decided to take him off the soy altogether, just use up what I’d bought and that’ll be it. The dietician said it’s safe in a diet with variety, but John’s restricted diet is not what I would describe as varied.

So, whilst things have been improved overall, we have had an up and down experience since, trying to balance what I know is best, what practitioners are telling me, and the symptoms we observe. As was the case with my health, we have found conventional medical wisdom and treatment useless in the fight.

People kept telling me John’s cradle cap, his obvious gastric/wind problems and such like as a baby were ‘normal’. Now people keep telling me, when John’s having a hyperactive reaction to food, that he’s a boy, he’s a normal active boy, and ‘normal’. But to quote a television ad from a few years ago “I used to think everything was normal, but now I know there’s a better kind of normal”. Normal is such a relative term! Based on observation, or statistics, or whatever, I cannot accept that what we are seeing in our world could ever be considered, let alone accepted, as normal!

I have read recently that children like John, with a parental health history like his, are considered by allergists or nutritionists and even some medical practitioners as ‘at risk’ babies and I’m alarmed that although I thought from the start that he was at risk, none of the professional people we came into contact with took this seriously, or were equipped with what I have now learned. We have had a wild goose chase to get answers. A couple of times I’ve gone back, to the doctors or the LCs or the nurses, and told them what we’ve found – but I’ve been met with at best vague interest or acknowledgement, mostly skepticism, and at worst complete criticism.

Some of the mums on our internet forum have said they’ve decided not to have any more children because their families have suffered even worse than we have and they can’t face doing it again. I can really sympathise with them. But actually I’m looking forward to the next baby as I am now armed with a much greater awareness and a great deal more knowledge and it will be interesting to see if my next ‘baby at risk’ benefits from this. I call it the ‘precautionary principle’ or “if in doubt don’t”. I’ve been told by many mothers that any other children I have may not have the same problems, but considering our family history I’m not convinced; and knowing all the things we did ‘wrong’ for John and doing things differently second time around will hopefully avoid the nightmare.

One of the things I often come across in conventional circles is the ‘need’ for scientific validation. For example, I requested we have a particular blood test done on John to help with working out his intolerances, as the elimination method is not working and is so tedious, at least some idea from an IgG blood test would be helpful. I was told this test is not considered valid. But then I question this view, as John’s diet is far from scientifically valid! It’s something I’ve thought a lot about… another example of this is to do with milk production. There are so many regulations for producing milk for supermarkets – what dairy farmers are allowed to feed their cows, how the milk is collected and processed, and so on – and yet there are not even any vague recommendations for lactating mothers, let alone ‘regulations’. This just doesn’t sit right with me at all. I won’t wait for scientific validation of what I can plainly see. Einstein is dead, but
that doesn’t matter, because it doesn’t take Einstein to see what we see, and we don’t need Einstein, or any other scientists for that matter, to back it up or understand it. I have heard that governments of European countries such as Sweden and Denmark are doing the same, issuing new guidelines and making new laws regarding food production and consumption, based simply on what can only be described as a ‘precautionary principle’. To do otherwise is to dice with danger. I fear for our generation and the next that it will be too late if we wait for science to catch up on what many parents already know for sure: there is something very wrong with the world we are trying to raise our children in. Politicians may promise to transform our childcare system for 0-5s, change tax laws and maternity leave, and hold summits to talk about the future of our country. What we need is action now, banning additives in all of our food (children and adults), changing our agriculture and
food production methods, publishing guidelines for pregnancy and lactation and investing in a healthy future instead of a health system which is failing.

I know we don’t live in a perfect world; I know I can’t afford to eat absolutely everything organic; I know there are things that we just don’t understand; and I know that those who do understand don’t agree on it all anyway! But I will continue to do what I have done from the start – my best. I just wish my best was more supported and understood. I have longed to tell our story in the hope of both making other parents aware but also making the medical and professional community dealing with children and parents aware of how inadequate or even detrimental much of their conventional advice and practice can be. But I know my story is just another anecdote among many. I know I am an idealist, but I, like any mother, will aim for the best for my children. And I know we don’t live in an ideal world, but I wish our governments were aiming for it. I know I am also a perfectionist, and I always tend to the ‘extremes’ when less would perhaps be adequate, but I’ve
always like the motto “better safe than sorry” as much as I like “if in doubt, don’t”. But I have come to realise, as with many things in motherhood, that my best is not always good enough. Along with this comes the realisation that as an individual I can only do my best, and that I have to be content with that, live within that, and not feel guilty for not achieving my ideal.

I’ve heard it said that the proponents of organics, or organizations such as those I have come across (the “Failsafe” methods, or Weston A Price traditions) are causing ‘fear’ because of their beliefs about the evils of chemicals / microwaves / milk / immunization / you-name-it, but I think there’s incredible freedom to be found in these methods and if they were followed more widely there would be no reason for fear, we would all be able to take the precautions we want to. The fear I feel every time I take my son anywhere I can’t control what he comes into contact with is far worse… the fear that slams through me when I see him pick up a flavoured biscuit or reach for someone’s plate of salad with egg mayonnaise… far far worse.

More often I am hearing discussion of food intolerances, additives, organics, etc. in the mass media. Television shows such as Jamie’s School Lunches are a good example. Websites recommending organic food for children are another. And warnings about certain additive numbers have been around for years. I hope against hope that the tide is turning, before it swamps us.

One other thing that most people acknowledge as a factor with eczema is stress. In adults it can be, for example, emotional or professional stress; in babies it can be, for example, stress ‘vibes’ from parents (particularly the mother) as well as teething difficulties. I have touched on some aspects of stress, and I think anyone who hears my story would know that just dealing with this is a cause for stress; but there were a couple of significant circumstances I have deliberately left out as although they were extremely stressful for me directly (and potentially implicated in their effect on John indirectly) they are personal and the details could be construed as an attempt to get sympathy or lay blame, and distract from what I really intend to communicate. I was aware of the potential of their affecting John and did my best to shield him from my emotional state at these times, and had the support from appropriate people to do so as best we could. Having said that, I do
wonder how much of the stress like I had, and the general stress in our world (mortgage stress, women working full-time with babies in child-care, rice shortages, watching the news – cyclones in Burma, earthquakes in China, tornados in America!) could affect our children?

More and more I am convinced that if I’d eaten better through pregnancy and lactation we may have avoided most of the damage done to him as well as the ill effects. The thing I find the most frustrating is not being able to understand what causes the problems. It’s all very well to have theories about eating an organic diet before, during and after pregnancy through lactation… even theories that go further, such as the theories about the common use of microwaves, the plastics in storing food, the chemicals in the environment, detergents used for the last century, the pasteurization and homogenization of milk, the use of mineral oil and petroleum based products on babies, the list goes on… none of these theories offer a complete solution. Even if we could scientifically prove that one or more of these is bad for us, I wonder how long it would take for our society to get rid of them, and even if we did get rid of them, I wonder how long it would take their effects to leave
our species. Then again, perhaps it would only take one generation… I saw a television documentary recently about reproduction affected by chemicals (it was initially to do with sperm count in humans and animals but investigated things on many levels) and they found an almost completely depleted population of sea urchin with all sorts of mutations caused by a paint on the local fishing fleet’s boats, which once they removed the paint the next generation of sea urchins were all fine. Perhaps there is hope for us? I hope so. I would love to have my next baby after my husband and I have lived in a bubble, have the perfect environment and diet during pregnancy and lactation and so on – impossible but perhaps it would prove whether or not it works.

If symptoms of illness are the barometer of the human body that something is wrong, children who suffer symptoms this severely are the barometer of the society that something is wrong. The waiting lists at hospital allergy clinics are getting longer and the rate of diagnosis of things such as ADHD is increasing. The fact that there are children who suffer much worse than John; the fact that I did so much ‘right’ and he still suffered so much; the fact that suffering like this is on the increase in both severity and frequency… doesn’t all of this point to something being very wrong in our world?

There’s a phrase I’ve had to use often: “the lesser of two evils”. For a simple example, I never liked dummies and John never wanted one, but he ended up needing one on holidays when he couldn’t sleep – the dummy was the lesser of two evils when the other option was sleep deprivation for all of us. A more complex example is trying to work out if I spend my money on organic food for John and buy cheap nappies, cheap food for us… it’s all a compromise. But this phrase has become inadequate to me now and I hate compromising! I’m concerned about how far I have to go before we get a cure… or the thought that it would make no difference to John because so much damage was done either during lactation, perhaps as far back as pregnancy, and maybe even before that… maybe as far back as our own health journey… maybe his paternal grandfather… maybe even further again…

I mentioned at the start the Vietnam War. Controversy still surrounds the history of this war, as does the outfall from the methods of warfare and their effects on not only the soldiers but generations following. But whether or not my husband and my son have been directly affected by Vietnam, or something even further back, I truly believe that we are engaged in a greater war. It is the war from the inside out. We are not only waging a war on ourselves in terms of what we have chosen as the way to produce and consume our food, and the way our health system treats illness with a dependence on pharmaceuticals; the war is also raging inside our bodies, starting on the inside and working its way out through whatever way it can, in John’s case out through his skin. And unless we can change this inside-out phenomena and turn our world upside-down (or actually right-side-up), I believe we are going to suffer consequences far worse than what I and my son have experienced.

Today – a snapshot.
John is 17 months old today. He’s having a really good day. He’s still recovering from the last food challenge but at least I haven’t had to put cortisone on him today, just moisturizer. I went shopping for him this morning, and he’s doing so well I’m planning the next few food challenges; two pots of yummy organic food are now simmering on the stove. But I’m wishing I could’ve afforded the chlorine-free nappies this month. Interest rates with our bank have gone up again this week and we are talking about what we’ll do, there’s very little ‘fat’ in the budget, but we are still better off than many people. At least John is ‘fat’ again so maybe he’ll start eating less now we’ve got his diet more balanced… there’s so much more I’d like to try with his diet – and ours - and I’m intrigued by the traditional diets I’m learning about at the moment. Going organic would be my dream, for all of us, but I’ll just start with buying the organic
preservative-free bread I’m ordering on the internet right now, that’s a good start. Then again maybe I’d better put the laptop away, John’s started walking confidently this week and has decided the laptop is a great toy now he can catch me off-guard and get his chubby little hands on the keys quickly. He’s learning new words and signs every day, and his favourite things in the world are his toy cars and his trike. Nothing wrong with his learning, just something very wrong with his little body that I wish I could fix. I can’t dwell on the worry about whether he’ll grow out of this at 2 or 20. At least today I feel more confident we are getting somewhere. I have days where I feel hopeless, and days when I feel like writing strongly worded letters to everyone from the Prime Minister down to current affairs programmes, but today isn’t one of them. I still feel like I can’t do enough, like it’s all too hard, like I’m failing him, like we’ve been let down
by others… but these feelings are, I’m told, a normal part of motherhood anyway, and I’m learning to put them aside. The old ‘serenity prayer’ is a good philosophy… accept the things I cannot change… change the things I can… right now I need to change his nappy and put him in his cot for a nap so I can finish up in the kitchen and sit down with a cuppa to read my emails. They encourage and inspire me, although they also make me feel like an idealistic activist sometimes, but I try not to dwell on that too much. Rather than trying to change the world forever, I realise I must be content to be the change I want to see in the world each day. At least I know John will sleep well without the torment of being itchy anymore; we have achieved that much and every day I see him playing or sleeping like a normal 17-month-old I am extremely thankful.

About the Author...

I am a princess. I am a daughter and sister and wife and mother and friend. I am very creative and have always wanted to be a nourisher but only recently discovered what that truly means, especially following my most important creative endeavour - my son. I continue to learn more about it and in relationship with my Creator I am confident I will become the nourisher and nurturer that I was made and meant to be.