We had a terrible time with Trent's in his first 12 months. It started as a small dry spot on his back which got bigger and quickly infected. Suddenly it spread across his whole back, legs, arms, tummy and face.

We'd no longer clear it and he'd get it back again and it would end up in infected and he'd get really sick and we'd end up in RCH seeing the allergy specialists. One time he even got a staph infection in it after we took him to a local hospital initially.

For months we used sorbolene or natural goats milk soap in the bath, lathered him in Dermaveen after a bath and tried to dress him only in natural fibres.

We saw the dermatologist outpatients at RCH for a few months before we finally saw David Hill for testing when he turned one and he came back clear on all foods (which we knew he would, we had eliminated them and he still got it), and nothing really stood out. The best he said we could do was 'manage it'.

We moved out of our house and into one with floor boards and his skin cleared straight up, so they put it down to fibres in the carpet! He has occasional flare ups now, but nothing major and only really gets them around my parents pets or older carpets.