Kellee: Life with eczema + ADHD
Getting to the root-cause of your skin condition can be rough — for lack of a better word. Newcastle-based Mum, registered-nurse-turned-ecomm-founder Kellee is an incredible warrior, who’s battled eczema for her whole life. There’s been ups and downs, but her story has been SO inspiring.
So, we’re gonna let Kellee take the floor here. Here’s her health story, in her own words:
I was diagnosed with ADHD around two years ago. Medication has been profoundly impactful but at the same time learning how to do life again at 40 in a way that is healthy for my brain, has been a steep learning curve and definitely not without many ups and downs.
I was diagnosed with eczema as a child. I don't remember being diagnosed. I just always remember having it and I've never known a life without it. I grew up in the country and to see a dermatologist meant a trip to Sydney, so it was a big deal. The treatment then was much the same as it is now. Steroids, moisturiser and avoid triggers, whatever they may be!
Over the years the severity has fluctuated dramatically. From a mild itch to utterly debilitating. I have always had it on my right hand, with occasional flares on my left and as a child I would get on the inside of my elbows and behind my knees.
Nursing and eczema.
A year or two into nursing my eczema really started to flare. I was using steroid creams everyday. My skin was thin, my nails deformed and I had no cuticles. I took a non clinical role to try and improve my symptoms thinking that the constant hand washing was exacerbating my symptoms. But there was no improvement at all. Interestingly I started drinking coffee around the same time I started nursing (#shiftwork).
With my career looking shaky, I saw a dermatologist for the first time in many years hoping there was some new treatment and to discuss the role of food in my flares. I left the appointment bitterly disappointed with the same treatment I had been prescribed for the past 25 years, with a dose of rather blunt advice that included 'there is no cure, you’re going to have to learn to live with it, and food has little to no role'.
I am a rather determined person by nature, and with a career on the line I was not gong to accept the advice. The next couple of years I tried a million and one different exclusion diets, trying to find a trigger that I could pinpoint. I navigated the process on my own and the success was variable and never lasting. Somewhere in the process I discovered/developed a whole new set of symptoms that affected my face. My eyes would swell, the skin would become dry and itchy and it was awful. I would manage with icepacks, antihistamines and occasionally oral steroids.
On one of my many rabbit holes of research I discovered a condition called Ribo Rash on the food intolerance network website. An increasingly common condition triggered by flavour enhancers used in savoury foods to enhance MSG. Once I excluded these foods, the symptoms on my face disappeared.
To cut a long story short, I also discovered that A1 cows milk protein and any milk/dairy powders used in food is my kryptonite. Avoid these triggers and I was able to manage incredibly well.
Motherhood and eczema.
Pregnancy was kind to me. My skin and hair was incredible. I could eat whatever I wanted (including dairy) and my skin did not flare at all.
However all good things come to an end. I would rebound hard at about 3 months postpartum, until I got pregnant again! I rode this wave for the 4 kids, each rebound period worse than the last.
Flares are debilitating. When my face was bright red and burning I didn't want to go out in public. I would avoid social settings because I was physically uncomfortable and self conscious.
My diet was so strict and I couldn't eat anything I actually wanted. Having a social glass of wine with friends was completely off the table. My house would become messy as I couldn't clean properly when my hands were cracked or bleeding, or if I did clean it would often trigger a flare even when wearing gloves as my hands were so fragile.
I've never known a life where thinking about my eczema wasn't factored in. It's only now that I feel like my life has returned to mostly normal that I look back and realise how much it was impacting my mental health.
After my 4th baby, my symptoms became utterly debilitating. It seemed my Ribo Rash was back with a vengeance, yet I was avoiding all the foods that would trigger. I excluded all dairy again. But nothing worked.
Around 6 months prior I had been diagnosed with ADHD and started medication, a life changing experience - but not without its own set of issues. While I was mentally doing really well, I was definitely running myself into the ground physically with a terrible diet due to poor appetite and fatigue from lack of sleep. I have no doubt the increased physical stress on my body had a huge impact on my skin.
I was managing with oral steroids, antinflammatories, creams - with no real idea what I was actually treating. Both hands were completely broken down. They would crack and bleed constantly. My face was red, dry and flaking. It burned in a way that is difficult to explain. I had no idea if it was eczema or something else.
I started seeing a naturopath who performed a gut microbiome test. I had extremely high levels of a bacteria that was inflammatory along with high histamine levels in my gut. We started working together, but progress was slow. My symptoms were so bad, we had to slow down the approach to not exacerbate the flares as the inflammatory gut bacteria was dying off.
Fast forward to 2024.
It was January and I was at my lowest. I had no cream left, My skin was drinking the Yours Only COAT and I had no more oral steroids left. Ash kindly Express Posted some MASK for me to slather on my skin, and it provided some relief to the burning & dryness. In desperation I rang around to some dermatologists, only to find that I was looking at a 12 month wait to see anyone. I was gutted.
I managed an appointment with my GP. Later that day I received a phone call from her saying she had managed an urgent referral within the week with my preferred dermatologist. I cried on the phone and for the first time felt like maybe there was some hope.
I attended the appointment a week later with the mindset that the dermatologist would determine that whatever was happening on my face was different to my hands, there would be a wonderful treatment and I would leave with a plan. This didn't happen.
Instead, she told me that my face was a flare of my eczema. That for women, significant flaring of eczema was extremely common after having children. In my head, I was just thinking 'here we go again'. After 30 years, the treatment and advice is still the same.
However, the appointment took a dramatic turn as the dermatologist started talking about treatment. She acknowledged how debilitating my symptoms were. That alone brought tears to my eyes. Then she said the following... 'While we can't cure you, we can absolutely improve your symptoms and your quality of life".
She acknowledged that diet, gut health and stress management was going to play a big role and was super supportive of my naturopath who was using evidence based complimentary treatment.
Then we started talking mainstream treatment. There was a fairly new injection specifically targeted to eczema treatment that was having great results. To qualify I had to fail a 30 day topical steroid challenge, and at the end of this meet a percentage of body surface area or have face/hands affected and have a reduction in quality of life score over a certain level.
30 days later, I returned having failed the challenge and ready to start it.
I has been 4 months now and my life is dramatically different. My diet is mostly normal now, although I still avoid the flavour enhancers & cows milk protein most of the time. I have cuticles on my nails, my hands are almost completely healed apart from one tiny spot the size of a 10 cent piece.
There isn't a cure or a single solution. It's a tough pill to swallow, but it is the unfortunate truth. Finding a great dermatologist is essential to having the impact of your symptoms validated and the comfort that you are actually getting the best treatment available to you.
There is absolutely a place for complimentary medicine along side mainstream medicine. But again choose your practitioners wisely! There are an endless line of health gurus that will willingly take your money, promise the world and provide little to no improvement.
Look for practitioners who used evidence based practices and ideally based their treatments on individual results of valid testing methods.
Just keep it simple. Life is not supposed to be overly complicated.
In nursing we used to say 'when you are allergic to everything, you are allergic to nothing'. By this I mean, if you are having to stick to a diet so strict that you have little variety, then the problem is not the food. It's you. Likely your gut. Look for the underlying cause rather than simply excluding the 'trigger'.
