A surprise at the doctor's

Abram has had a terrible time with his skin ever since he was born.  I think he was about three-four months old in this picture, and his skin had gotten so bad that the whole first layer of skin had come off on both sides of his face, and he had long red, gooey sores there, and rough skin everywhere else, in place of soft kissable baby skin.  I tried everything I could think of (in this picture I tried Neosporin, covered with saran wrap, to hold it on) and anything that anyone recommended: Cetaphil, Vanicream, etc.  Nothing worked.  When the skin covering his entire body became raised and red, we took him to the Dermatologist. (I know that sounds like a no-brainer, but all the moms "in the know" claimed that nothing could be done for really bad eczema.)

It turned out that the skin covering his whole entire body was infected, and he was prescribed an antibiotic, and a whole box of things for his skin.  We still use his skin regimen every day and if I forget for even one day, he wakes up with his red, itchy, rough skin.

Well, for the last month he has had some bumps that have formed all over his body that look like white moles or something.  At first he got one on the back of his neck, then on his hands, chest and a few on his face. At first I just thought they were unsightly moles and felt bad for the little fellow, but when they kept appearing I got a little worried and finally took him back to the Dermatologist.

Abe's hands after the medicine caused his bumps to blister.

He said it was some kind of a virus, kind of like warts, that he was probably more susceptible to because of his skin problems.  He told me that  I could try pinching them off, but he didn't recommend it because it could scar really badly.  So then he very quickly touched each of them with some liquid-type of medicine, and we were good to go.

When I got to the front counter all set to pay my $30.00 co-pay,  I was told "that will be $212.00 - your insurance paid most of it."  What??!!  That was some expensive medicine, and I would have appreciated knowing how expensive it was, in advance, because I would have chosen to pinch them off myself, as I can't see how it could cause worse scarring than the sores he has now.  Is it really O.K for doctor's to tell you how much something is going to cost AFTER the fact?  Grrr... I think I have learned a painful lesson.

Meanwhile, Abram is very excited to show everyone his owies, so at least he got some satisfaction from it all.