Eczema Blues: Staying Positive as a Stressed Parent
It’s my first guest blogger! Welcome to Marcie’s Mom! Hers was one of the very first eczema blogs, Eczema Blues, I came across that was targeted to parents. I particularly like her cartoons about how our life, dealing with eczema, is quite different from other parents. And she has just started a support group for parents in Singapore. I’ve asked her to share her story and the inspiration behind her blog.
Hi! I’m the mom of baby girl Marcie, who has eczema from two weeks old. Her eczema was pretty serious, all over her body and she had to take a one-time oral steroid course before it became manageable. It was very stressful taking care of her as a stay-at-home mom – apart from the usual stress faced by first-time mom, there’s additional stress with stopping Marcie from scratching and figuring out how to manage her eczema. When Marcie’s eczema got better, I decided to start a blog to share tips on managing eczema and offer a light-hearted approach to it, keeping to my blog’s motto “Turning Blues to Bliss”. Much of the motivation came from remembering my own experience of researching on the web late into the night, and often ended up even more tired, confused and worried.
From Information Posts to Cartoons
Sometime in August, I decided to offer my readers who are mostly stressed out parents with a weekly cartoon series “101 things that Moms with Eczema Child do Differently“. I always loved cartooning, dreaming of one day being a cartoonist, and this offers an excellent avenue for me to draw, and for a purpose – to give parents a good laugh to lighten their day. At the same time, it offers a friendly way to inform the public how much eczema affects the parents’ life and hopefully, they will be of better support to their friends or relatives who have to deal with their children’s eczema.
A Unique Book for Eczema Children
I also created a picture book “A to Z Animals Are Not Scratching!“, and all the animals in this book were drawn by me on Adobe Illustrator. I love graphic design as well, and almost set up my own stationery store, selling of course, all the stationery designed by me. I haven’t sold any stationery though, but I have designed and donated over 10,000 bookmarks featuring different Swahili bible verses for missionaries to bring to Africa. The inspiration for this children book really came from Marcie, because she loves reading, especially books on animals and alphabets. So once again, my creative self needed an outlet and I started creating the picture book.
Turning Blues to Bliss
Making life better for stressed out parents gives me the motivation for the blog – even if it’s just for the few seconds they laugh at a cartoon or the few minutes they save researching a topic. I’ve also started a support group in Singapore to offer parents a safe place to share with others who’d understand. I’m also passionate about lower income families with eczema children as I can’t imagine how to manage the eczema without money for treatment or moisturizers or having to work shifts to make ends meet. To help this group, I’m working with a non-profit to set up a fund to subsidize their medical costs. Hopefully, all eczema children will have a better quality of life, along with happier parents.
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Thanks Marcie! I’ll be sure to pass along the information on her new non-profit, once it’s established. What a motivated mom!
FROM: Contributors, Eczema
Thanks Jennifer for asking me to write for your blog, and it’s my pleasure to be the first guest blogger!
Well, it was an honor to have you! Anytime you feel inspired to write again for Itchy Little World, let me know. I see you’ve been getting a few click thrus to your site, so that’s great news.
Hi! Like to update everyone that the eczema fund is in place starting Jan 2012!
You can read more and find out how to donate to it in the link below; it’s started by my seed donation, but if response is overwhelming, will need more donation!
https://eczemablues.com/2012/01/first-eczema-fund-in-singapore/
How wonderful! What a great thing you’re doing Mei! Let me know if you want to write a guest post about this.