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Why Your Child’s Eczema May Be a Gut Problem

Why Your Child’s Eczema May Be a Gut Problem

About the Expert

Andra McHugh

Andra McHugh

Founder of Eczema Kids, Host of the Eczema Kids Podcast

I’m Andra McHugh. Founder of Eczema Kids, podcaster and mom of four.I help families reverse childhood eczema naturally by addressing what’s really causing it: gut dysfunction, immune overload, and toxic environmental exposures.After two of my kids suffered from severe, life-altering eczema, I went all in on healing, ditching prescriptions and elimination diets that weren’t working, and creating a system that actually does. That system became the Eczema Elimination Method, now used by hundreds of families around the world to restore calm skin and confidence...without steroids, confusion, or shame.I also run a full line of eczema-safe skincare, from tallow-based healing creams to herbal oils and mineral sunscreen, and host the top-rated Eczema Kids Podcast, where I share real solutions for real parents who are ready to get their kids off the inflammation hamster wheel.If you’re a parent, practitioner, or brand aligned with reversing chronic symptoms from the inside out, let’s connect.

More from Andra McHugh on DrTalks

Guest

Julia Ward, MD

Dr. Julia Ward

Dr. Julia Ward is a compassionate and forward-thinking physician with over a decade of experience in functional medicine, known for her systems-based approach to healing chronic illness. She is the founder of Balanced Body Functional Medicine, where she helps patients uncover the deeper drivers of disease and restore health by addressing the body as an interconnected whole.
After earning her medical degree from the University of Southern California, Dr. Ward served in the U.S. Navy, practicing general, urgent, and emergency medicine both domestically and abroad. Her own personal struggle with unexplained fatigue led her to question the limitations of conventional medicine and ultimately guided her toward functional medicine.
While she initially focused on identifying root causes, Dr. Ward’s approach has continued to evolve. She now emphasizes the importance of how and when the body is treated—not just what is treated. Through her Balanced Body System Reset™ framework, she focuses on restoring nervous system balance, improving mitochondrial function, reducing inflammation, and addressing root causes in the right sequence to create lasting and meaningful healing.
Dr. Ward integrates advanced diagnostics, personalized care plans, and innovative therapies such as hyperbaric oxygen and ozone therapy, while also emphasizing foundational elements like nervous system regulation, lifestyle, and patient engagement. She believes that healing is not a one-size-fits-all process, but a guided journey that requires both strategy and active participation.
A lifelong learner, Dr. Ward continues to expand her expertise in areas such as precision genomics, brain health, and complex chronic illness. She is deeply committed to helping her patients not only feel better, but truly understand their bodies and take ownership of their health.
A devoted wife and mother of five, Dr. Ward brings both clinical expertise and personal insight to her work, with a mission to transform the way chronic illness is understood and treated.

More from Julia Ward, MD on DrTalks

Hey team, welcome back to the eczema kids podcast. Today we're diving straight into the place that everyone thinks about last but honestly needs to be the first step for any real eczema healing and that's the gut.

So today I'm sitting down with Dr. Julia Ward. She's a functional medicine doctor who sees every corner condition including eczema through the lens of the gut and the liver and the body's overwhelmed detox and immune systems.

And let me tell you, she gets the families that are listening to this show. She has been a mom that dealt with the sleepless nights and the mystery reactions.

And I've already done everything with fatigue. And I just want you to know that if that's you listening to this, you're in good company. Dr. Ward is going to walk us through what's actually happening when your child's microbiome is inflamed or depleted and how toxins and infections overload their system and what to do when the diet keeps getting smaller and smaller and smaller and how to rebuild resilience so your child can eventually return to food freedom because that's our goal, right?

And as we talk about the microbiome today, I want you to remember you can support that healing environment every single day at home. That's why I created our prebiotic herbal tea and the skin comfort trio.

The tea gently feeds the good gut bugs and supports digestion without triggering histamine And the trio calms the skin from the outside in while you work on the inside.

If you are in the trenches, these are incredibly supportive tools. You can grab them both at eczemakids.com inside the eczema shop. Okay, deep breath.

Let's get into our conversation with Dr. Ward. Is your child struggling with itchy nights and endless flare ups? I'm Andra McHugh, mom of four and host of eczema kids.

Here you'll find natural solutions that actually work so you can heal your child's eczema without steroids, without the overwhelm, and finally see calm, healthy skin again.

Let's get into it. Hi, Dr. Ward. I'm so happy that you're here. Thank you so much for having me. I appreciate it. Oh, my pleasure. With your expertise and experience, you have so much to offer everyone who's listening and everyone who's listening as a parent of a child with eczema or they're experiencing eczema themselves and You know, there's certainly worse things, right?

There's childhood cancer and there's really awful things that are happening right now. But when you're in it and you're not sleeping and your child's miserable and they're scratching their skin off and you can't even like set down your baby because they'll just make their skin bleed and you're waking up every three hours, right?

The suffering is so, so real. And that's why I'm really excited for our conversation today because your background is in functional medicine. And I know you can help everyone listening a lot.

So when someone comes to you and they're experiencing a chronic condition like eczema and they're already doing all the things, like I imagine everyone that comes to you, they've already gone down a few routes, a few rabbit holes, and are really trying their very best.

But when they come to you and they've done all the things in terms of diet and environment, where do you begin? Yeah, usually I start with gut health because there is such a link between the gut and the skin, like most people are not aware of and quite frankly we're not taught much of in traditional medical school or, you know, residency internship, that type of thing.

But so I do tend to look at the gut first and see like what's going on with the digestion. You know, there's usually some inflammation going on there.

But yeah, you want to find out, you know, what's driving the inflammation? What's out of balance in the gut microbiome? Is the immune system overwhelmed by toxins or infections?

Are there any nutrient deficiencies or food triggers that might be playing a role? So it's really important to kind of look upstream and identify root causes.

Once you start healing the gut, the skin usually falls into place. Yeah, absolutely. So what are some of those gut patterns that make you think, oh, it's inflammation, which was my understanding.

It's like, that's the root of all disease, right? It's like inflammation in some way, but what are those key drivers that maybe this population, the ones that are experiencing something chronic like eczema, but then not able to overcome it with the regular stuff?

What are those root drivers of inflammation that you're seeing? Yeah. So, you know, we talk about leaky gut or gut hyperpermeability. That's where the gut lining becomes sort of permeable.

So if you imagine our gut as, you know, it's a single tube going from mouth to anus. And when you flatten everything out, it really comes down to just one cell layer between the inside of our stomach and intestine versus the inside of the body.

And that one cell layer can get inflamed because of things like medications, infections, stress, toxins in the environment. And when it's inflamed, there are these kind of gaps in between the cells.

And so when there's gaps in between the cells, now whatever's in our stomach or intestine, whether that's food particles or bacteria, can just go directly into the bloodstream.

And so that puts the immune system on high alert. It will start attacking those foreign particles as it should. But after months or years, the immune system gets confused and it starts attacking our own cells.

Dysbiosis is just a term we use that basically means that the gut microbiome is out of balance because we've got good beneficial bacteria that we want.

Sometimes that will get overgrown by sort of what we call opportunistic bacteria. Maybe not necessarily causing you harm, but it's not doing you any good either, and it's taking up space so that you don't get the beneficial bacteria that are in there.

Some people have a yeast overgrowth, a candida overgrowth. This is especially true if you've had a lot of antibiotics. Low stomach acid, this is a big one because so many people get put just sort of automatically on these antacids, these proton pump inhibitors and things like that for symptoms like reflux.

Well, it's maybe not so much with kids. But low stomach acid can certainly cause a problem with digestion. But it's a big problem with kids, right? Reflux is a big thing, especially in this pediatric population.

So yeah, absolutely. Keep going. Yeah. And constipation. I mean, if you're not pooping on a daily basis, you're sort of recirculating your toxins. And so that's a big one.

And I know from experiencing, like, I'm the mom of five kids, and I feel like all of my kids were a little bit more constipated, and that just would cause some issues.

So that's something to keep in mind, too. If you're not having those daily bowel movements, that's a problem. What are some things that you've done for your kids to help in that department?

Well, when my kids were young, this is long before I even knew about functional medicine. So I was much more on the traditional lactulose or Miralax, you know, to get them to, you know, you kind of do what you have to.

The more natural way now is obviously increasing the fiber in the diet, increasing the fruits and the vegetables. But it's hard, right? Because not all kids are willing to eat whatever you put in front of them.

And I guess if I were treating my kids now, I would look more towards some natural fibers and maybe some things like magnesium, some vitamin C. There's some really good Ayurvedic herbs that are good for just moving the bowels as well.

Yeah, just being more aware of that and helping them, you know, making sure that they're having daily bowel movements. Yeah, I know that was a big concern for my kids when we were really going through it.

And six years ago, two of my kids were suffering from severe, severe eczema. And so that's how we kind of got into this. Parents, are you exhausted from battling your child's eczema?

You've tried the prescriptions, the creams, the elimination diets, and the flares keep coming back. I'm Andrea McHugh, mama for and host of the eczema kids podcast.

Two of my children suffered with severe eczema and I know the sleepless nights and the nonstop itching and the frustration of feeling like nothing works.

That's why I created this podcast to share what actually does from natural solutions that calm the skin to practical everyday tips that make healing actually possible.

You'll find hope, clarity, and a path forward here. Follow eXimaKids wherever you get your podcasts and head to eXimaKids.com for free recipes and resources to start your child's healing journey today.

I would love to hear more about your history and your training because we did the same thing. You know, we started down the allopathic route and went to the pediatrician, as one does when you have sick kids, and they just were like, well, steroids and bleach fast is like what we have for you.

This is it. Yeah. I left there just feeling defeated, but also determined to do it a different way. And so I would love to hear more about your background and your training.

Well, I went to regular medical school. I did an OB-GYN internship. I was in the Navy at the time, and then I went out in the field with the Marines, served with them for a year, and then came back and did some anesthesia training.

Ended up just doing general practice. And it wasn't until about 15, 16 years ago that I got into the functional medicine side of things. And that really just kind of reignited my passion for medicine because before that I had pretty much gotten pretty burnt out.

What helped you find? integrative medicine. I was quite selfishly searching for ways to prevent menopause in myself. I was about 45 at the time and I was feeling just really exhausted, like so exhausted that I was falling asleep driving to work in the morning, you know.

Something is not right, and yet traditional medicine just didn't have any answers for me as far as that goes. And I certainly did not want to get stuck with that label of chronic fatigue syndrome, although somebody might have called me that at that point.

And so it was in my research trying to find out, you know, what are these bioidentical hormones? Would they be able to help me? That I really found functional medicine and started studying that.

And it's been amazing, you know, ever since. And it's all connected. We've talked about those gut patterns that you're seeing that lead to the dysbiosis, that lead to the inflammation, that lead to all the problems that go down the road.

But can you talk to us more about those liver and detox pathways and how those connect to that chronic inflammation that drives eczema in a way that makes sense for the parents listening that do not have your background?

So kids have like developing detox systems, so they're a little more sensitive to environmental toxins than adults. So things like mold toxins or mycotoxins, pesticides, fragrances, chemicals in personal care products, they can create like a higher toxic load, meaning that the body has more to handle than it can safely process.

So when the detox systems get overloaded, the immune system becomes hypersensitive, and then the skin becomes sort of a release valve for inflammation.

You know, eczema is sometimes the body saying, hey, I'm overwhelmed. You need to help me reduce my toxic load. I agree. I mean, philosophically, I agree with everything that you're saying.

Yeah, in a way we're lucky, especially if we're dealing with these problems and our kids are really young, it's like, okay, their inflammation buckets are already full.

And, you know, we need to identify what we can control and significantly lessen it. And that's what we do is just we work through and, you know, holistically, how can we stop those inflammation assailants, you know, from penetrating their bodies like all day every day?

How can you help a parent know the difference between like, if you're thinking, well, food is the problem versus the body is just overwhelmed and then reacting to everything?

Yeah, that's a great question. And I think that that's definitely a very nuanced kind of a thing to be able to tell, you know. Is the child reacting to the food specifically or is it just an overabundance of all these other toxins?

I would say that the most, as you know, like the most inflammatory foods that we could take out, and this would be a good sort of trial to do, is take out things like gluten.

Dairy, gluten dairy and sugar I think are the big ones to take out and see what happens because a lot of times symptoms may resolve on their own if you take away some of these high inflammatory foods.

We certainly do have food allergy and sensitivity testing that we can do through specialty labs. not through the standard, you know, Quest or LabCorp.

And they look at a list of, say, 88 different foods, and they're looking at an IgE, which is a true allergy. They're looking at IgG, which is a sensitivity.

And the trick about the sensitivity reactions is it takes a couple days for that to really develop symptoms. And so you can eat the food today, but you don't develop symptoms until two to three days later.

So that makes it sort of hard to pinpoint food to symptom. So if you're going down that rabbit hole, like say you have, you know, maybe an IgE allergy to dairy.

So you've augmented dairy for a while and then like your child is still reacting or you're still reacting to everything and then you just. start to bubble wrap your diet more and more.

You take out- Yeah, there's definitely a danger in being overly restrictive. And if you find that you're down to like two or three foods and that's the only thing that you can tolerate or your child can tolerate, you really need to look and see, well, what is causing this?

There's got to be something else that's sort of annoying the immune system, if you will, that's causing it to flare up like this. So are there mycotoxins in the environment?

And that's probably one of the more commonly overlooked ones, mold and mycotoxin illness. Here in Houston, we're in a very humid climate. There's a ton of flooding that happens all the time.

So you'd be hard pressed to find a building that didn't have some sort of mold or mycotoxin. kind of thing going on. And so it's important to say, you know, is that an issue going on?

Because that can certainly cause a lot of immune hypersensitivity and overreaction to different things. So if that's where you're at, the diet's just whittled down and still experiencing the unfavorable symptoms.

Is that where you go to next as you start with testing? Yes, and we actually have a couple of questionnaires that we'll have people do first before we do go to testing just to see if they're scoring high enough on like a mold questionnaire or a Lyme questionnaire and see if that's a place that we need to explore further.

So if you're there and you can't afford, like, a lot of testing, what are, like, the top one or two things that you'd prioritize? Well, it depends. Again, like, if you're scoring high enough on a mold questionnaire, I would definitely do a urine mycotoxin test to see, you know, because if there's mycotoxins in the urine, then they're somewhere in the body.

You're excreting them. And that's, you know, that's not normal. Lyme testing is a lot more expensive and that's much more of a clinical diagnosis that you have to determine.

It's never going to be just one test because there's a multitude of different strains and a variety of different things that can cause all these symptoms.

Unfortunately, it's not a quick and easy kind of a thing. So are there any tests that your clients are coming to you that they've already done that don't really move the needle and aren't really helping them heal?

Well, like the standard blood work that you get at a doctor's, like a metabolic panel or a CBC, you know, which is showing like liver function, kidney function, electrolytes, like those are typically not going to be abnormal, you know, and so that's why people will go to their traditional insurance-based doctor and say, well, they did all the tests and everything was normal.

And it's like, well, they just weren't doing the right tests for what you have, you know, so. I just shattered my leg like three months ago and I spent a full seven days, I had to have two surgeries and a full seven days in the hospital.

And so they just do a CBC on you like every day, I don't know, maybe even twice a day. And they're just like, and it's like, obviously. I hear you. Yeah, it's so funny that I feel like that's such an old school kind of a thing to do.

You know, like when I was in medical school over 30 years ago and we had these inpatients at the county hospital and every day we would do a metabolic panel and a cbc yeah and like that was just you didn't even question it you were just like well this is what we do because they're here in the hospital and And then they were just like, well, maybe we should not be doing this every day.

And, you know, people were like, well, why? They're here. This is what we do. It's so crazy. I mean, I would prefer that over other things. But I mean, so say antibiotics then is like a big part of your history for whatever reason.

How do you start to rebuild your microbiome if that's been a big part of your history? You know, when your kid's sick, especially with an ear infection, you're going to give them whatever it takes to get rid of that pain.

You know, I had a friend once say, you know, if I thought it would help, I would pour motor oil down their ear, you know, because you're just like, ah, we got to fix this.

But then, and, you know, you look back, you're like, wow, my child's been on, you know, five courses of antibiotics in the past year. And that really does a number on the gut microbiome.

So then I think it's important to start probiotics are definitely important. Immunoglobulins are another thing that are really beneficial. Yeah. And immunoglobulins are what is present in the colostrum or the pre-milk.

And it really helps seal up a leaky gut. and just tell the immune system, hey, you don't need to react to this food. And you can get the immunoglobulins that are serum-based, meaning that there's no dairy product in them.

And they come in powder capsules, but that's really good for healing the gut. There's other herbal stuff as well that's really good for the gut, obviously.

And making sure you have enough fiber in the diet as well to feed the colon cells, that's also very important. Are there any other supplements for eczema specifically, skin conditions, in addition to IgG, colostrum, what would you say might help with the itch?

I would say anything that's going to help decrease inflammation, like fish oils, These special pro-resolving mediators, also really good. There's some calming herbs for the gut lining itself.

I'm sort of blanking on some of the names right now, but I have like combination products that kind of help calm down the gut lining, if you will. Can you go into the mediators for a little bit more?

What is it? Specialized? Specialized pro-resolving mediators. Okay. And then it's sort of like a supercharged fish oil. And it's meant to be taken in conjunction with regular fish oil, but it stops the whole inflammatory cascade, if you will.

Mm-hmm. Yeah. So that's been really good. There's one brand called Metagenix that makes a good SPM and they call it SPM active. Nice. We'll link that in the show notes and look into that further.

Thank you. Yeah. Are there any other just foundational nutrients or supports that you often find that are missing in people that are experiencing eczema?

Well, you know, obviously we want to focus on like the diet, making sure that people are eating whole food, you know, clean, no processed foods. You want to make sure that they're getting a lot of fiber, vegetables, some of these omega-3 rich foods, really cut down on the sugar because sugar can often exacerbate these eczema flares.

And making sure that kids are getting enough sleep because that, you know, that's when we're healing and regenerating so that we need to have enough sleep.

And hydration is also extremely important. Skin can't heal if it's dehydrated all the time. How old are your kids now? Now they're all in their 20s. When they were growing up, Or even now.

Like, are there any electrolyte mixes or things like that that you approve or how do you help them with hydration? I know some of my kids, like, they'll just drink a sip of water.

It's kind of the same. You know, I didn't, but I as a kid, I was like, juice box will take care of all my hydration needs for the whole day, just at lunch, that's good.

You know, how do you help those kids along that don't seem to? I usually suggest some electrolyte powder that tends to be flavored. And there's a variety of different brands out there that you can use.

You know, they come in these little packets. that you can just pour into a water bottle. It flavors it, but it also gives nutrients as far as electrolytes and minerals.

So it tends to be more balanced. Because I know when I was younger, I didn't like water. I think I grew up on Diet Coke. Yeah. I know. I know. I don't anymore, but that was, you know.

That was the carrot that my parents used to dangle. It was like, you can have a sip of Diet Coke if you go clean your room. I was like, yeah. And then that was just on top of like the juice that I was already drinking.

It's just so crazy looking back. You're doing everything right. You've cleaned up the diet. You've swapped out the soaps. You've put air filters in every room.

Maybe you even live on an organic farm and still your child is scratching, bleeding, awake all night. The flares won't stop and no one can tell you why.

No parent should have to watch their child suffer, especially when you're already doing everything in your power to fix it. That's why I created the eczema kids podcast.

I'm Andrea McHugh, mama for health coach and the founder of eczema kids. Two of my own children battled with relentless eczema and I know firsthand how heartbreaking and exhausting it is.

Here we go beyond surface level fixes. You'll learn how to uncover hidden triggers, prepare your child's gut and calm their skin from the inside out. You'll hear the real stories of families who found freedom and insights from practitioners who are rewriting what's possible.

Because eczema isn't just a skin condition, it's a message from the body. And when you listen, you can heal. So follow eczema kits wherever you get your podcasts and start your child's healing journey today.

What do you feel like conventional doctors are missing in these kids and adults? Kids are people too. What do you think is missing now that you have this functional medicine lens to look through?

I think what's missing is that knowledge about the gut and the microbiome and how the gut and the skin are so intimately linked. because that was never anything that we learned in medical school or even residency.

Back then, everything was just so siloed into different organ systems as if they were completely separate and not communicating. So I would say being more aware of the gut health is probably the biggest thing.

So I guess just to promote a healthy microbiome on top of the whole foods diet, fiber and the hydration, what else do you feel like needs to just be a part of the preventative slash recovery plan?

I would say a good probiotic, maybe a prebiotic. and depending on the state of the gut, an immunoglobulin. When somebody is starting to see improvement, like their less itch and better sleep and calmer skins, when do you feel like they might be ready to start reintroducing some foods?

Because like we talked about earlier, we don't want to whittle it down so much, but I do feel like there's a place to, you know, we need to omit those like big offenders that you spoke to earlier, the gluten, the dairy, and the excess sugars.

as along with a few extra things for eczema specifically during that healing phase. Yeah. What do you look for, you know, just when you're recovering from a chronic, you know, inflammation type of condition of any sort, like when do you think that you're ready to start reintroducing healthy whole foods like sourdough bread?

I would say, you know, at least be symptom free for two to four weeks before reintroducing. And then when you do reintroduce food, start with just one food at a time and take in one new food and don't add another one in for at least three days.

give that one food like three days to see if you're going to have a reaction or not because that's the sensitivity part. You know, like you eat the food today and you may not have a reaction, but maybe two or three days from now you would.

So you don't want to muddy the water by adding in more foods too soon. So that's probably, you know, just going as slow as possible is going to be more beneficial.

I was willing to just keep up what we were doing forever if that meant we never had to go back to, you know, the ex-mon nightmare that we were living before.

But I know my kids eat everything and that's our ultimate goal, right? Just like freedom. Pharmaceutical-free and clear, healthy skin, right? That's what we're going for.

But I know a lot of people are anxious to get there, to the freedom part. when I have patients who go through like our detox programs and they're doing really well and then they go and have a weekend somewhere and they they come back and they'll say I slipped up I had a hamburger or I had a beer or something like that and oh my gosh I felt horrible and I was like okay good so now you know like that feels like what gluten does to you so in in some ways it's it can be, you know, like, okay, if you go without it for a long period of time and then you introduce it and you do have a reaction, you're like, okay, well, maybe this is just not for me.

Certainly not at this point in time. So do you feel like everyone can get to ultimate food freedom or do you feel like some people are a little bit past that?

Theoretically, everybody can get back to that. It just depends what the triggers are and what it was that was causing the inflammation and the reaction in the first place.

So are you out of a moldy environment or are you free of a viral infection or maybe it's Lyme disease, something like that. So you have to address what was causing it in the first place.

But I think theoretically people can get back to how they were before, which is tolerating foods. Agreed, right? Like, what we're going to do is, like, build back the body's capacity to do what it's meant to do, and you should be able to eat sourdough bread, and you should be able to eat, I mean, everything under the sun, right?

And it'd be just fine, as long as, like, 80-20, your diet is pretty good. Yeah. So, that's hopeful, right? But I think, especially with kids, right? They just haven't had dessert for long enough to have messed up so badly that not repairable.

It's repairable. Absolutely. And that's the advantage with kids is that they're just naturally more in that repairing mode because they're more in that growth mode.

Yeah, cellular turnover is just so much quicker. If you could go back and talk to yourself as a new doctor or a new mom, what would you say about chronic conditions like eczema?

Because I know you had a child that But suffered from eczema, right? Yeah, our first child had horrendous eczema when she was just a month or two old.

I mean, like her cheeks were flaming red. She had little, you know, little dots all over the place. I mean, it was, you know, and we had to keep her hands in these little mitten things so that she would scratch herself.

And I remember going to the dermatologist and this was at a teaching hospital. And so, of course, they're bringing in all the colleagues like, oh, come look at this really bad case.

You don't want to be in that position where your child is just like a textbook of this is really bad. And it ended up being okay. I don't know what the trigger was back then.

That was always sort of a mystery because she was being breastfed at the time. And I think it was just, honestly, I don't know what the trigger was. But it did seem to clear up with just a little bit of some hydrocortisone cream.

So we were fortunate in that it wasn't super prolonged, but it seemed to hang around for several weeks. And our next child also had a little bit of eczema, so there's definitely a genetic sort of predisposition for these things.

You know, and then genetically we're all put together differently and we all detox at different rates and things like that, so another thing that now we can look at those things.

which is really cool. I love doing these genomic testing because it's just a cheek swab and you get a ton of information about things like inflammation, how you detox, how you incorporate vitamins and minerals in, just all sorts of really great information that you can then become like, once you know that, okay, well, here's maybe something that will help us improve that with a natural supplement or a lifestyle change.

Do you offer those genomic testing? We do. We do that through a company called Intellex DNA. So when your kids were little and I guess, you know, putting yourself back in those shoes, what would you do knowing what you know now or the next month to just support your child's health and their healing, if need be?

I guess I would be more conscious about making sure that they're eating not so much processed foods. You know, I think especially when you're a mom of multiple kids, you're in this sort of survival mode and you're just like, okay, feed them.

And so I think I would be a little more conscious about limiting the processed foods, making sure that they're getting in enough fiber and the fruits and the vegetables so that they're having regular bowel movements and just learning to like all different kinds of foods.

I think that's important too. I think kids' natural tendency is to want the same things over and over again because they know it, it's comforting. But yet, your job as a parent is to introduce them to a variety of foods so that they're not so restricted.

Well, thank you so much for your time today, Dr. Ward. This is really, really helpful. And where can everyone find and follow you? My website is drjuliaward.com.

And our clinic phone number is 281-710-3380. Great. We'll put all of that in the show notes. That is super generous. And you host a podcast as well, right?

Yes, I do. I have the Functional Edge podcast. And that is on my website and all the Apple podcasts and the platforms. Perfect. Thank you so much, Dr.

Ward. Have a good day. Thank you so much. My pleasure. What I love about Dr. Ward's perspective is how grounding it is. It's not, this is broken or you must eliminate 47 foods forever.

It's the body is overwhelmed, but it can be rebuilt and the gut can be sealed and the microbiome can actually flourish again. And kids especially have so much capacity for repair.

Like that's the good news guys. That's silver lining here is that we're dealing with this when they're so young. And sometimes we just need to remove what's irritating and then add back what's nourishing and give their system the support that it's been begging for.

That's what we do here. So if this episode lit a fire under you to actually start rebuilding the gut, not just reacting to flare after flare. Remember, you don't have to do this alone.

A few simple daily steps can move the needle in a very big way, even in this holiday season that we're in. Our prebiotic herbal tea is one of those steps.

Kids tolerate it beautifully because it's gentle, it's not fermented, and it feeds the good bacteria without feeding the bad. And while you're retraining the immune system from the inside, the Skin Comfort Trio handles the outside, calming the itch, protecting the barrier, and helping your child finally sleep.

You can get both at eczemakids.com inside the eczema shop. And if you're ready for that full healing roadmap, you're always invited into the eczema elimination method.

If you're looking for health, and a full night's sleep this holiday season, that is the place for you. Your child's body wants to heal. It's as simple as that.

The body is made to heal. They weren't meant to be here to be living in these itchy, scratchy bodies. All they need is a little bit of support and some intentional navigating their environment so that we get these kiddos what they need.

So have an amazing holiday, friends, and I will talk to you just before the new year. Take care. Thank you for helping with my eczema. Love you. Thank you for listening today, friend.

I know healing your child's skin isn't easy, but you're doing it one smart step at a time. If this episode gave you a little hope or a better night's sleep, leave a quick review so more exhausted parents can find eczema kids and finally rest easy too.

Follow, share, and let's help more kids heal. Take care.