My eldest son has suffered from eczema off and on for his entire childhood. He recently had a flare up despite his usual krill oil, vitamin and mineral supplement routine. I hadn’t changed our washing powder, he hadn’t changed soap personal care products, hasn’t changed his diet, it was just an unexplained flare up. Boo.  I figured it was the perfect time to try something new and the opportunity to review the Hope’s Relief products came at exactly the right time.

Being a herbalist, I am well familiar with what a real herbal cream should look and feel like. The first thing I noticed about the Hope’s Relief cream was that it felt and smelt just like a cream I’d make up in my clinic. It has that herby brown look to it which tells me it really does contain therapeutic amounts of quality herbal extracts. It smelt really herby too. No stinky artificial smells, just therapeutic herby goodness.

The problem I’ve had with some of the herbal creams I have made up for my biggest boy is that the base I use is quite thick and it sticks to his clothes and takes a long time to penetrate the skin. The Hope’s Relief cream is a perfect consistency and gets into the skin quickly without leaving a greasy residue.

Within 24 hours of starting the cream, Mr Biggest Boy had stopped telling me his eczema was itchy or hurting. Within a week I noticed that I was only having to apply the cream to two patches on his back. The smaller patches on his tummy, arms and legs had disappeared. The 2 patches on his back were markedly better. They were now mostly just dry, not red and angry looking. Certainly not cracked and bleeding like they had been before we started.

The other product that came with the cream was the Hope’s Relief cleansing bar. Mr Biggest Boy doesn’t use soap at all because even the most natural unscented soaps tend to cause a flare up in symptoms. I got him to start using the cleansing bar and it hasn’t caused any problems. The cleaning bar is better than his usual no soap routine because because water alone can be quite drying to the skin. The bar contains aloe vera, calendula and manuka honey which makes it healing, moisturising and antimicrobial. It’s the perfect product to use in combination with the cream.

Hope’s Relief has given me a cream and a cleansing bar to give away to a Natural Transition family. To gain entries to the giveaway, you need to comment on this post. I’d love to know what you’ve tried to treat eczema, what’s work or not worked for you. You can earn extra entries by liking the Hope’s Relief facebook page and by sharing this comp on facebook or twitter. When you comment on this post be sure to let me know what you’ve done to get your entries. I’ll draw the winner on December 5 at 5pm.

Update- The winner is Kerry 🙂 Here’s hoping your little one finds it as good as my son has.