I haven’t written in this blog as frequently as I have been hoping for – and for good reason:
I’m getting married! (hooray!)
I’m actually getting married in about 2 weeks time (so exciting – I can’t wait!), and all this marriage prep has been taking a toll on me (and my time). After the next 2-3 weeks after my wedding and honeymoon period is over, I’ll definitely be able to write more frequently again (so just you watch out for more posts here!). 😉
The man I’m marrying is the same man who stuck with me when my eczema flared up all over my body. He stuck with me through the hard times, said I love you when my skin was flaking everywhere, and was with me during my eczema healing process. I’m so blessed to become his wife – and I hope all of you know that you deserve to be loved even when you have an eczema flare up! 🙂
Your eczema, too, can reach a place of healing – and I want to share with you today on:
5 reasons why your eczema is not healing
Low Vitamin D Levels
Although Vitamin D comes from the sun – just living in a sunny city may not give you enough Vitamin D you need. For instance, the sun-filled Arizona contains one of the most Vitamin D deficient population in the States. In fact, Scientists have found that vitamin D is crucial to activating our immune system and healing eczema.
Without sufficient vitamin D, the killer cells of the immune system (T cells) won’t be able to react and fight off infections in the body. A fault in the immune memory can cause eczema/dermatitis and psoriasis. One research study conducted by Stefanie and Kilian Eyerich showed that both diseases are caused by an impaired immunological memory. In addition, low serum vitamin D level is inversely associated with eczema in German children and adolescents.
I like this Seeking Health Optimal Vitamin D
Heavy Metal Toxicity
Yes…heavy metals can also affect your eczema healing! These are examples of heavy metals I’m referring to:
- Lead (found in lipstick or even water pipes that are still made of lead)
- Mercury (found in fish or even mercury fillings)
- Iron
- Arsenic
- Cadmium
- Nickel
- Bismuth
Heavy metal poisoning can affect any organ in your body. The most serious affects are seen in the blood and central nervous system. Heavy metals can also seriously harm detoxification organs (the liver, kidneys and lungs), which can create eczema, since heavy metal poisoning involves skin irritation and damage to skin cells.
Eczema can also show up as a form of contact allergy, since heavy metals, such as mercury, lead, copper, chromium, cobalt, and nickel, can trigger contact allergy will appear as eczema wounds. 
So the question is – how do you know if you have heavy metals? Almost everyone has some form of heavy metal in their body these days. It’s not really a question of whether you have it, but it is more a question of how much you have in your cells.
You can check to see if you have heavy metal toxicity by doing a hair mineral analysis or a urine test (the urine test is usually more accurate, and it involves consuming a liquid chelating agent that will pull heavy metals out of your tissue and will reveal if you have heavy metal toxicity in your body).
This is why detoxification is so important for your skin – the more you can detox toxins and heavy metals out of your body, the less chance it can irritate your skin and immune system and the more you’ll see signs eczema is healing.
Healing Eczema from the Inside Out: Diet & Intestinal Permeability
Intestinal permeability (aka. leaky gut) can be a huge factor that affects eczema. I definitely had a leaky gut: I was constantly gassy, had trouble digesting foods, and had tingling sensations in my body when I ate the wrong foods. I saw a strong correlation with my gassyness and my skin.
The more my skin healed, the more my gas and bloating also healed, because my gut was healing! Most people with eczema have gut dysbiosis, since the skin is a reflection of what is happening inside the body. I started healing eczema with diet by eating a lot of probiotics (with at least 10 billion CFU) and filled my diet with fermented foods, such as sauerkraut. This improved my digestion and filled my gut with good bacteria to help my skin heal!
Doctors also used to give me antibiotics frequently whenever I was not feeling too well, so I stopped relying on antibiotics (since they can really kill a lot of the good bacteria in the gut). My skin would dry out as a side effect of the antibiotics, so by eliminating/reducing it and relying on natural antibiotics like garlic, onions, and oregano oil, this has kept my gut healthier and happier. 🙂 Stay away from processed foods as these can definitely affect it as well!
Too Much Stress
We often overlook stress and we don’t even realize the extent that it affects us. During the eczema healing stages, I had a lot of trouble healing the last 5-10% of my skin. I was so frustrated because I couldn’t figure out why, when I was doing so much to help it get better; I was eating what most people would call a “perfect” diet, and I was exercising.
It wasn’t until I quit my really stressful job, that the eczema natural healing started! Why? Simply because I removed the biggest stressor in my life, and the flare ups naturally disappeared. Going to bed early is also a huge help. I was never able to sleep before midnight (even if I tried to sleep at 10pm!), so once I removed the stressors, I was finally able to sleep well throughout the night.
My itching reduced dramatically, and the insomnia that I had dealt with since I was a teenager finally also disappeared along with it. Quitting my job was the best decision I ever made at that time. Although I temporarily lacked money financially, I gained back my health. And, like they say, health is your greatest wealth.
Deficiency in Omega 3′s
Your skin is made up of fatty acids, and unfortunately, our diet in modern society is made up of too much Omega 6 and not enough Omega 3’s (which leads to inflammation). If your ratio of omega-3 and omega-6 is imbalanced (and studies show that most people nowadays have a ratio of 25:1 Omega 6 to Omega 3), you’ll most likely be more prone to having inflammation.
Since omega-3’s also help the body product important anti-inflammatory hormones, falling short of it can contribute to conditions, such as eczema, asthma, rheumatoid arthritis, and heart disease. A severe deficiency of omega-3 fatty acids can also result in dry skin, hair loss and an impaired immune system.
When my eczema flared up like crazy, I doubled the dosage from 1-2 grams a day to 3-4 grams a day to reduce the inflammation. If you use a good quality fish oil, you’ll notice that the quality and softness of your skin will change as well (especially if you have eczema). Make sure to look for a good quality fish oil, like Nutrasea.
Don’t be alarmed if your healing does not come overnight. Since it’s taken years for bad habits of toxins to accumulate in your body, natural eczema healing will also take some time for your body to reverse the damage. 😉
Biography
Abby is a Registered Holistic Nutritionist who helps clients achieve optimal health. She is passionate about seeing people use health and nutrition to transform lives. She hopes that her experiences and knowledge can help educate others on natural remedies that will help eczema. Follow her on Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest, Instagram, orYouTube for more updates!
Huge congrats on getting married! I myself am getting ‘hitched’ in July and I am still battling against my eczema after 3 years (wouldn’t it be great not to have any on THE wedding day!?) – my fiancé has also been a great help and support, even when the eczema was at its worse. He’s even ready to eat the same ‘healthy’ diet than me until I heal completely 🙂
wishing you all the best and keep up the good job!
Thanks so much! Congrats on getting hitched too 😉 It’s great that we both have fiance’s who support us so much – it’s difficult to find! I hope your eczema improves for your wedding day!
Hi Abby, Thanks so much for your site and info for how to heal eczema with diet. I am currently going through topical steroid withdrawals and sufferering from Red Skin Syndrome like you said you were. There is a mentality on the forums for Topical Steroid Addiction that only time will heal it and there is nothing you can do but have patience because prior sufferers did nothing but stop their steroids but there have been many who still have eczema after Red Skin Syndrome and they don’t know what the difference is and if they are “healed”. I’ve done my research on all healed eczema sufferers and discovered that you and Donia from Natural Eczema Healing both had Red Skin Syndrome but healed it fast with diet. The time for withdrawals is over a year to several years and I recently was on a blog of a girl who flew to Japan to see a doctor who knew about Topical Steroid Addiction because she has been going through it for 10 years but I’m of the belief that it’s not Topical Steroid Addiction, just that the steroids damaged our body and guts extremely and now we cannot process any toxins which is why we flare so badly all the time. Everyone thinks it’s just the steroids but I have tried informing them that it is diet and other factors too like Candida and metal poisoning so you have to go get checked and then heal it with food, and that you can 100% speed up healing with a healing anti inflammatory diet and the importance of healing the gut with foods but I just got banned on the main forum for trying to explain that we don’t just flare because of the withdrawals but because of the food sensitivities which are a million times worse now that our gut is so damaged from drug abuse. I also explained that antibiotic use would prolong healing times because we should be trying to heal our guts but medication damages even further and for Red Skin Sufferers, this is very serious. What are your thoughts, you did nothing the first time and it came back, do you think it’s possible to speed up withdrawals and heal with diet?
Yes definitely! Diet plays a HUGE role in healing for many reasons – also because it can affect your gut. The healthier your gut is – the quicker your toxins will leave, the stronger your immune system is – and the happier your skin will be 🙂
I have had severe eczema my whole life, the last 4-5 years it spread to my face and my dermatologist gave me protopic. I used protopic for about 3 years and now my skin can’t live without it. my face is constantly red, itchy and flaky. I have stopped using protopic for about 4 months and I don’t know what to do for relief. I have been using Cortizone 10 and i know i shouldn’t be but i get so tired of walking around with a red scaly face, the cortisone makes me feel better for a couple days. i can’t find anything natural to sooth the itch and keep me hydrated. coconut oil dries out very badly. I am testing out 100% shea butter so hopefully that works, since I’ve had my son (he is 1.5yrs) my eczema is really bad all over, I haven’t had it this bad since i was a kid! I mostly need help the the itch when i sleep, if you have any suggestions it would be greatly appreciated!
Hi Jerae, thanks for stopping by my blog! I wouldn’t recommend staying on cortisone/steroids long term, even if it feels like your skin depends on it. The medication only suppresses the inflammation but doesn’t heal it from the inside out. Have you heard of topical steroid withdrawal before? You should check out Itsan.org for more info. I hope your skin heals! 🙂
Are there any probiotics you recommend? I would like to try one for myself and my children and I definitely think we would benefit, but I am a probiotic newbie!
Another good Omega 3 option is a supplement derived from algae (which if I understand this properly, is where the fish get their omega 3s from in the first place). It doesn’t have the risk of being contaminated with heavy metals, like fish oils often are. Fish oils can often be quite high in vitamin A, and too much is hazardous. Since our family generally avoids animal products I’ve been focusing on getting more Omega 3’s into our diet through chia, flax, and hemp. But I’m hoping to also find a local source for an algae derived omega 3 supplement to kick our intake up a notch.
Thanks so much for the helpful post, and it sounds like you’ve married a wonderful man 🙂
Hi Amy! Here’s a list of probiotics I recommend: https://primephysiquenutrition.com/products-i-use (under the “Probiotics” section).
Algae’s are great – there’s also vegetarian DHA options you can get from your local health food store! I used to work at a health food store, and there are definitely vegetarian options available (I believe these are micro algae). Also, I believe it’s Cod Liver Oil that’s high in Vitamin A – but Omega 3 fish oils are generally better.
Hope you find something that works for you, Amy! 🙂
Thanks so much for the tips! I’ll check out your probiotics info 🙂
Yes, we all usually try to treat the consequences, not the causes- inflammation. People are different but the principle is the same – we must lose the cause of the disease. Shortly my story. I had psoriatic arthritis with diagnosis L40.0(-) and now I’m fine using a new 100% natural Omega 3 product(with vitamin D3) from a North-European producer (they promise a ratio of 3:1 or lower). As I was sceptic I measured, and still do, Omega 3 effect and Omega 6:3 ratio due to its importance!
I use a blood test from leading independent laboratories. This is a simple dry blood-spot test for home sample collection. Leading laboratories analyze the sample to determine our fatty acid profile as a reflection of our diet. The balance test identifies levels of 11 fatty acids in the blood with 98% certainty. We will learn our blood levels of omega-3 and your ratio of omega 6:3 for balance, plus receive a report to increase our health and dietary awareness. Test results will show whether our diet is balanced or unbalanced.
My first test ratio was 8,4:1, second after four months 3,4:1 and third a year later 1,6:1 and I´m fine.
Finally, if we hold a ratio 3:1 or lower then all life style diseases (skin, joints, asthma, allergies, diabetes 2, high blood pressure, thyroid, osteoporosis, cardiovascular diseases etc.) will start disappearing and I know lot of recovered people now.
Thanks for some great information! I had never heard of heavy metal toxicity linked to eczema. Wow!
Yes it’s definitely tied to it as well.
Just great thanks. I’m reading all your blog and working out my plan for my daughter and I. Congratulations on the marriage.
Hello,
If I have a fish allergy, what would you recommend as a alternative to the omegas? Thank you!
Vegan DHA is a good alternative 🙂 it’s usually made from algae oil.
I can’t do fermented foods like raw sauerkraut they nake me itch and break ne out worse
Thanks for your article and information on Eczema. Dermatologist did a skin biopsy few months back that says it’s a form of eczema. I have never had this rash in my life or other rashes other from stress or cats that went away in a couple of weeks. This rash made me stressed out all summer this year 2018. I got the rash in March and still have it. Only prednisone reduces all the red, flaky skin on face, neck, arms, hands, under my hair in the back of neck, ankles, legs and heel. The thick white skin looks like psoriasis and I found a way to get rid of it for a while. I am in the process of changing one product at a time to see if it works. Dermatologist believes it’s the washing product for clothes or shampoo or conditioner. I was told not to take omega fish oil it could slow down my healing, also, lowered my vitamin D3 intake to half what I am taking. He says I am taking too much. I take vitamins everyday and I never had anyone tell me I’m taking to much of one. I have been taking these for over 10 years. I am using a Rx cream for itch but I am also using other creams that get rid of the white flaky skin on my face and eyes. I have a red rash around both eyes and the left is the worse and eyes swells up, puffy and one eye waters all the time regardless if I have makeup on or not. Washing face does the same. This on the back of neck and back and all on my face looks like psoriasis or dandruff on the skin. I take probiotics so I am going to up mine and see if it helps me. It’s only been a little over eight months since I’ve had this. This rash also caused lots of stress for me. Nervous all this past summer. I just thought of sharing what I happened. I also using a face soap I picked up at the Dermatology Center and only used it a few times and my neck is not rough or red anymore. Not sure if this is from the face cleanser but something is healing my neck. Thanks for your article.