blah… i can’t sleep. I’m very stressed. Ethan had his doctor’s appointment yesterday and we had some bad news. First of all, he has another ear infection, so he couldn’t get his shots. The ear infection doesn’t seem to be too bad because he is sleeping fine (night 2 in the crib) and he hasn’t run fever. The doctor prescribed him an antibiotic to take if he starts running fever or acting like he feels really bad.
Second piece of bad news… she let me know that his lack of weight gain is cause for concern. He has weighed 17 1/2 to 18 lbs for several months now and his weight no longer plots on the growth charts. We have to start pumping him full of calories and monitoring his weight. If he doesn’t gain lots of weight and plot on the chart, he will need to see a specialist.
It is frustrating because I have been worried about his skinniness for some time now and she repeatedly reassured me that he was fine. I had finally gotten it through my head that he IS fine and that it is OK for him to be so skinny. I had finally stopped being crazy and stressed out over it. Now I am told that he is unhealthy and failing to thrive.
I made an appointment with another pediatrician to get a second opinion. I don’t doubt that he is too skinny. Like I said, I have been so worried about it for months now. I would like a second opinion because I feel that his current pediatrician has been inconsistent in her views and that is frustrating for me. I am annoyed that I have been worried for so long about it and told it wasn’t a problem. I talked to the doctor several times about the fact that he refused to drink breastmilk or formula from a bottle or cup. That he has only gained three pounds since he was 6 months old. That he doesn’t make very wet diapers anymore. That most days he barely eats anything. And the answers were always that I shouldn’t worry, he won’t starve himself, he will eat what he needs to eat, babies breastmilk intake reduces at this age and he gets everything he needs from only 3 feedings, and so on.
And not just the pediatrician, but everyone who knows Ethan encouraged me in feeling that he was perfectly healthy. He is developing properly mentally and physically. He is burning off all the calories that he eats. He is just a thin baby. I’m not saying that they are wrong for encouraging me. I appreciate that everyone has tried to make me feel better about it and not worry so much. It is, however, incredibly frustrating to have felt like a crazy person for so long for worrying unnecessarily about his weight only to now be told that he DOES have a problem with weight.
Do you know how difficult it is to cope with a gut feeling that something is wrong despite everyone telling you otherwise? Then to finally get over that insanity and stop worrying so much just to be told that you may have been right all along and to start worrying again. I’m going to drive myself crazy. Brandi says “I think there is a problem… I have noticed XYZ” and everyone else says “Oh, don’t worry about that, its perfectly normal. you are reading into things”. Later on Brandi says “Oh, I have noticed something else. I think there is a problem.” and everyone else says “You worry too much. He is perfectly fine.” later on Brandi says “I really think there is something wrong because XYZ valid reasons”. And everyone else says “Really, stop worrying, you are getting annoying. You are imagining there is a problem when everything is really fine. You are going to make everyone else crazy with all of your stress.” Brandi says “OK, fine I will just have to trust that everything is OK”. Then….. “Oh, guess what… there is a problem. You need to start worrying.”
Really, I just need to stop now because I am going to make myself ill.