Weston had his 4 month check up this week with Dr Wells. He weighed in at 15 pounds and 7 ounces (50th percentile), and his length is 25 1/2 inches (75th percentile)...and in case you were wondering, his head is between the 50 and 75th percentile (he has a big head like his daddy). Everything supposedly looked and sounded good (I'll be honest, I've never even laid a stethoscope on him...so I take her word for it). Developmentally, Weston is cooing, smiling, rolling over some, eating his hands, and thankfully seems to be hearing and seeing fine. No concerns really for either of us at this visit. I am still pumping and giving Weston breastmilk exclusively, which I planned on doing for 6 months, but Dr Wells made a good point to me the other day that I hadn't really considered. She told me that even though the breastfeeding council recommends breastmilk only until 6 months, most kids have a 'window of opportunity' for introducing solids, and she's found that waiting until 6 months to even try solids sometimes causes more frustration for parents, and oral/sensory problems for baby. What's the evidence behind that? I'm not sure for now, just anecdotal I guess, but I'm going to look into it. Hey, my parents gave us solids at like two weeks...and we turned out fine...I still became a doctor. So the plan is to wait until 5 months, when Weston has a little better head control and can sit a little better (he's not showing many signs of readiness for solids just yet), and then start rice cereal just once a day for "practice" not necessarily for nutrition. And then continue introducing the rest of the solids at 6 months. Works for me.
What else? Oh, shots...yes, Weston had his 4 month shots this week, which he did great with when he got them...he cried for like a minute. Then he slept like 3 hours at daycare afterward and slept all night when we got home, but the next night was a different story. Sometimes I wonder who switched out my baby for someone else. That second night about an hour and a half before bedtime he just screamed bloody murder for a solid hour and 20 minutes before getting so tired he finally went to sleep. There wasn't anything we could do. I gave him a dose of tylenol after about a half hour of the screaming, and that definitely did nothing, but at least he didn't spit it out at me like usual. I'm not a fan of scheduling tylenol, I just give it if he seems like he might be in pain...and there's evidence now that scheduling tylenol when giving immunizations might actually decrease the effectiveness of the vaccines - I digress. Anyways, after that Rolland and I had to just switch off holding him every 20 minutes or so because you can only take so much of the all-out screaming, and there was no way we could just put him in his bed like that...believe me, it doesn't work. Eventually he lost the fight and Rolland was holding him when the batteries wore down and he fell asleep (only to wake in about 4 hours to be starving...I'm sure he burned plenty calories during the screaming death match). Anyhow, the 2nd night after the shots went a little smoother, Weston lost fight to sleep after only 10 minutes of screaming, and then Rolland and I got to eat dinner together.
The only other thing I've been watching is Weston's hemangioma on his 2nd toe on the right foot. He wasn't born with it, and there's nothing that caused or could have prevented it (except that I always joked that me baby would come out with some big hemangioma...and funny thing, he did develop one, but not on the head). So, this thing showed up when Weston was about 3 or 4 weeks old, I think..it was one of those things where I was undressing him for his bath and I saw a red spot on his toe and I thought is he bleeding...no. Then I thought, has that always been there? Of course before you start to give your baby tub baths, how much do you look at their toes? Well, I know it wasn't there when my mom visited at 2 weeks, or when he had newborn pictures at 3 weeks, or when my dad visited at Christmas...so I can't really nail it down, but it just "showed up". These hemangiomas (blood vessel tumors) have a little rule about them. They tend to get bigger in the beginning, and some can get really big, and then they sort of die from the inside out and eventually fade away with almost nothing to show for themselves. The rule we pediatricians tell parents is that 50% will be gone by age 5, 60% by age 6, 70% by age 7, and so on. With a hemangioma as tiny as this that really hasn't changed at all since age 3 months, I'm not sure how long it will last, but I bet it'll be gone long before age 5 years. There isn't much recommendation for treatment for these unless they are really big and ulcerate and bleed, get infected, or are in a place where they might occlude vision or airway. So we continue to watch and wait and see what it does on it's own. He sure doesn't care about it.
What else? Oh, shots...yes, Weston had his 4 month shots this week, which he did great with when he got them...he cried for like a minute. Then he slept like 3 hours at daycare afterward and slept all night when we got home, but the next night was a different story. Sometimes I wonder who switched out my baby for someone else. That second night about an hour and a half before bedtime he just screamed bloody murder for a solid hour and 20 minutes before getting so tired he finally went to sleep. There wasn't anything we could do. I gave him a dose of tylenol after about a half hour of the screaming, and that definitely did nothing, but at least he didn't spit it out at me like usual. I'm not a fan of scheduling tylenol, I just give it if he seems like he might be in pain...and there's evidence now that scheduling tylenol when giving immunizations might actually decrease the effectiveness of the vaccines - I digress. Anyways, after that Rolland and I had to just switch off holding him every 20 minutes or so because you can only take so much of the all-out screaming, and there was no way we could just put him in his bed like that...believe me, it doesn't work. Eventually he lost the fight and Rolland was holding him when the batteries wore down and he fell asleep (only to wake in about 4 hours to be starving...I'm sure he burned plenty calories during the screaming death match). Anyhow, the 2nd night after the shots went a little smoother, Weston lost fight to sleep after only 10 minutes of screaming, and then Rolland and I got to eat dinner together.
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| Hemangioma at 3 months |
I've never really heard much about the window of opportunity when it comes to starting solids. What I've heard a lot about is watching their readiness signs, which is what we focused on. Actually, my goal was to start right at 6 months, and Aiden was ready before we were! That really meant that he tried his first solids like a week before that...and he only ate something maybe twice before turning 6 months because we really eased in. But he was SO ready. I know most of the signs include (and you're probably well versed in all of this!) holding his head up and sitting, watching and showing interest when you eat (not just watching but really interested in it), his tongue-thrust reflex gone, bringing things to his mouth, having the ability to self-regulate and stop eating/drinking/nursing when full (will turn away from the spoon if he is actually full and not cont to eat just b/c it's being given to him), etc.
ReplyDeleteHere's a website I used a lot for solids info. We made all of Aiden's baby food, which is actually SO VERY EASY. I think many think it's more complicated than it really is. Hardly took any extra time (we just made extras of things like sweet potatoes, etc, when we made them for our dinners and then pureed/smashed some to freeze for later or save in the fridge for that week). I didn't focus much on "recipes" - but the site is great for info on when to give certain foods, which ones have more nitrates (either wait a little longer on those or use organic), etc, etc. Just thought I would share, in case you were interested. http://wholesomebabyfood.com/
Weelicious has a lot of stuff on baby foods, too, I think. She recently posted how to make rice cereal, too. We actually did make some rice cereal for Aiden. He never was a big fan, so we moved on. He did like steel cut oats when he had that, though. I gave Camden jarred foods and Aiden homemade foods...and I can tell a BIG difference in how well the two of them eat. Aiden has even gone through a bit of a picky stage lately - I think all toddlers do! But even with that, he is such a better eater than Camden was (and kind of better than Camden is even now at almost 12 years!). And even when he's picky, the stuff he prefers is healthy stuff, so we can't really complain. I don't know if it really had to do w/ making his food homemade, but I do know it tastes a lot more like real food than jarred. ;) So...might have made the difference. Who knows.
Also...you should have gotten it by now. Ryan finally got Weston's baby gift in the mail. ;) I'm sorry it took so long! We kept meaning to get it out to you all, and a couple times I thought he had sent it when he had misheard something or whatever. Anyway, he finally did get it out. I don't have your email and am not on facebook until Easter, so I thought I would just leave a comment here. The book is one of Aiden's favorites - was one he had us read at night every night for the longest time. (We got the Christmas version for him at Christmas this year - great book!! Does a good job of explaining the focus of the season without Santa-bashing, too.) The nose thing...we STILL use that with Aiden! He'll ask for it sometimes (sometimes he fights it, but not much). The nasal aspirators were always so difficult to use with him, and he fought so much we were worried he would get hurt. But the nosefrida...though it does look funny and takes some getting used to...really works, and we never worried about hurting his nose. We couldn't live without that thing, really! Anyway, we hope they both work out well for you. They were two things we really are grateful for and wanted to share. :)