Wednesday, May 6, 2009

Weighty Issues

What weight is the "right" weight for each child? How does anyone even begin to know that answer, we are all very different and our bodies process everything differently. There are weight charts to be followed and those that fall below it seem to be picked on while those that hit the top and even possibly go off the chart are not.

I chatted with our U of I doctor about this and me feeling as though I'm trying to turn my daughter into a "fattie". That's really the only way I can describe it to anyone, I know she won't get too big by what she is eating BUT I'm really getting tired of all this. Dr. Dusdieker admitted that really it's up to the child's doctor/pediatrician wether or not they are concerned with a child's weight. We just got "lucky" and had a doctor that freaked out about Bella's slow weight gain AND a pediatrician who kind of just pushed us to the U of I like he didn't know what to do with us. I mean I will admit, I was a terrified first time mother with a small baby who would not eat and thus not gain weight. I was concerned for her health and wanted to do whatever I could to help her. I just feel as though we've passed that point now, Bella is fine, I know she is.

Bella does have Failure to Thrive, Kyle had it when he was a baby too. I know they take that into perspective and are just making sure she is continuing to grow and are wanting her to grow at a "normal" rate. But my point is, how is there this "normal" rate, it's like it's some law we need to abide by!

Bella was 23.1 pounds yesterday AND she grew an inch! To me you have to take into consideration that she grew a full inch in three months, she has never grown that "tall" in a three month period. But no, it all comes down to the measly 1 gram a day she gained. The "norm" is 5-8 grams a day, so guess what???

That's right, we get to go back on August 11th!

The good thing is that there will be no more dietician appointments, I put my foot down on that. I'm tired of paying $60 for a five minute appointment where we discuss the same crap we discussed three months ago! They tried telling me that the dietician is part of the program, BUT I did it, I stuck to my guns and got rid of that wasteful hour!

Now these appointments should only take up about 2 hours of my day rather than 4, thank god.

Note to any parents reading this, don't get sucked into some program like this unless they can tell you it's something that will negatively affect the child's health/life. The negative impact of this for Bella is - she is and will be small...duh. Now we're stuck until they "release" Bella, we'll just keep chugging along!

1 comment:

nlaug said...

Way to put your foot down! It's amazing how being a mom makes us stick up for things that we may have let go in the past-NICE WORK!!! Sorry you have to go back, but I am proud of you for sticking up for yourself and for Bella.