★★★★★
I have to share my experience here because one year ago my 6 year old was diagnosed with lichen planus through a biopsy. We were thrilled to finally have a name to put with the horrible skin reaction that had covered our son's body (only his face and mouth were clear) and lost as to what to do next. The doctor prescribed three meds. The steroid cream I had to apply to his body using rubber gloves because I was going through steroid treatment for pneumonia (second time I had it). That was scary for me. Every time I would put it on him I would think, "I'm supposed to treat this child with this strong steroid indefinately?! ". The next drug was just supposed to put moisture back on his skin but it was new and I was nervous since I was the victim of a new drug that was later recalled for disasterous side effects. The third was to help him sleep and not scratch his skin at night. We gave that to him once or twice but it knocked him out cold and it was difficult to get him to wake up the next morning.
I know we could have lowered the dosage, etc. But something in me snapped. I was sick and tired of everyone in my family being sick and tired. I searched everywhere on the internet for a cure, including this site. Nothing worked. Then I stumbled across the website drmcdougall.com. I read it all night (I have chronic insomnia too). We had tried so many things that I decided we could try eating the ultra-healthy mcdougall way. It was hard, but it wasn't a pill that might be recalled in a few years. We eliminated all fats, dairy, processed foods (even the processed vegetarian stuff), meat, oils and sugar. We ate a ton of vegetables, fruits, potatoes, sweet potatoes, rice, barley, beans, quinoa... You get the picture.
Within a week, the swelling went down on the lichen planus sores. Within two weeks we noticed that he had less spots. Within a few months his hair in the places he had lost it actually started to grow back! Shortly after that, he was completely symptom free! The whole family followed the diet (my teenager bought junk at school for the first while and then even that little bit became unappetizing) and we are all finally healthy again. I got over my asthma, pneumonia, even my arthritis pain went away completely, other family members went through winter without getting sick... Not even a cold! My husband and I lost weight and the kids have continued to grow at the same rate they did before. Now we eat the mcdougall way about 90% of the time. When my son spent two weeks at grandma's this summer his lichen planus came back on his back, arms and legs. A few weeks of eating the mcdougall diet helped him to become symptom free again.
I really hope this helps someone. I hope you try it. Everything on mcdougall's site is free. So it really won't cost you anything. We bought one book of his after we were already seeing results because I wanted to be thourough. I also bought a mcdougall cookbook after a while. It isn't necessary though since he lists a lot of recipes for free anyway. I felt that I needed more recipes since this is our lifestyle now and not a diet per se.
