Alisha's Story told by her mother Rooksana

Nirvana, Matthew and Alisha

Nirvana is one of many children from all over the world who suffers with eczema. She is over the moon here in Avéne because she is able to spend time with two other children form South Africa. Their names are Alisha and Matthew. These children are really wonderful and have very hard stories. Enjoy Alisha's journey below:

Alisha's Story told by her mother Rooksana:

When Alisha was a year old the eczema started on her neck. Her parents took her to a government hospital and the doctors explained that the condition would lessen, and disappear as she got older. When a parent hears that, one feels consoling relief because no parent wishes a condition like this upon a child. However, contrary to the doctor’s predictions, the eczema only got worse. As Alisha grew, the eczema spread to her knees and elbows. By the time she was 18 months old, Alisha was put on medication and landed up in hospital every month. Eventually a blood test was requested. This was indeed a traumatic time.  For a mother to see her baby with a needle in her tiny arm is just heart breaking. There was even a situation when the needle came out of Alisha’s arm and blood sprayed everywhere. Alisha screamed in pain and her mother actually passed out from the trauma. In a situation like this, the mother feels helpless. What can a mother do for her child in pain?

For 10 years, this journey has been really tough for little Alisha and her family. With hospital visits, doctors, medications, creams; this child has been through it all. The treatment at Avéne is the last hope for lasting healing. When Alisha arrived, her skin was very dry, itchy and with dark spots. With sincere gratitude, the treatment seems to be working – the dryness and itching has reduced significantly.

What Alisha's mother says:

Alisha has been going to hospital for the past 10 years of her life. In the past 1 year, flare- ups happen almost every month, where we would take her to hospital every 2 weeks. Doctors put her on different types of tablets, steroid creams and syrups. She would not go to school for weeks, and she is a child who loves to go to school. It was hard on her with the eczema, as children would make fun of her skin, call her funny names and sometimes she would come home crying and sad.

As Alisha was growing up, it was hard. I was working and on the days off, we would be take the bus early in the morning to get to the hospital and stay there the whole day. At night it was the hardest- she would wake up crying and scratching, so I would put socks over her hands and sometimes would wrap her body up, but that did not work. As the years went by I learned more about eczema. When Alisha was around 4 years I did an allergy test for her, because one day she had sea food and her face and mouth swole up so bad, to the point that it was hard for her to breathe. On another occasion, she was in day care and there was a birthday party so she was given a little party pack and butter cream cake, so like any little child she enjoyed herself with that. That night while I was putting her to bed, there were small matter pimples under her arms, and I did not think much of it. But in the morning her whole body was full of matter pimples; it was spreading, and she was in  pain. It was the weekend and so we took her to the hospital, where we had to wait for a few hours before we could see the doctor. He just said that it was eczema and gave us creams and pain syrup. By Sunday she had gone worse: her skin was peeling off all over her tiny little body! We took her to our GP, and he told us that she had weeping eczema and she picked up an infection. He had to give her steroid  injections, one each day, for 3 days. We were also given antibiotic creams and syrups. That's when we did an allergy test and learned that she had an allergy for sea foods and icing powder and some vegetables.

Three months ago her doctor at the hospital told us about the Avene Hydrotherapy Center, where there is  treatment for Atopic eczema and that they are going to take children from South Africa for it- and Alisha would be one of the children that would be going. For us this was the last hope we had because everything else was not helping. Thanks to Pierre Fabre, the doctor, and Meagan, we are now in France at the Avene  Hydrotherapy Center. Alisha has started her treatment and it is going well- her skin is not so dry and the itching has reduced. The skin is much softer and smoother. We are hoping that this will help her in the long term with aid of the creams that she has been given to use.