Rough Day

BB had her one year checkup today, and it turned out to be much more difficult than I'd expected. We love our pediatrician, so that wasn't the problem. It was the short morning nap, plus the three shots, plus the blood draw. Actually, it was mostly the blood draw. By the time it was over, she was hysterical and I was about to break down myself.

I'd anticipated a visit to the phlebotomist, since we did the same thing with BJ: our old house, which almost certainly has lead paint, means the kids need to get checked for lead. But other things I mentioned at the appointment led our doctor to suggest a few other blood tests (nothing too serious, I hope, but best to be sure.... BB had a bruise that took almost a month to heal, and she's had a month's worth of teething which has led to a lot of ibuprofen use). It sounds perfectly logical to say, "Go ahead and run them, since she'll have to get stuck anyway," so I did -- but what I neglected to realize at the time was it also meant she ended up having to have four vials of blood drawn. 10 ml. That's a lot of blood for a little girl, poor boo!

We are also anxiously awaiting a call from the craniofacial specialist to whom our pediatrician has referred us. I hope it turns out to be nothing more than the "familial macrocephaly" that BJ was diagnosed with when we took him to the specialist during his first year of life. Since birth, BJ's head has consistently measured off the charts, and it turns out that S also has a humongous noggin, hence the diagnosis (which is a harmless condition that basically translates to "your family has a big head"). I hadn't expected we'd need to worry about this with BB, because until today's visit there wasn't anything alarming on her growth chart. But today she showed a huge jump to 48.5 cm, way off the charts, when at her last visit three months ago she'd been in the 94th percentile at 46 cm. So off to the specialist we go.

The other vitals looked good. She's 29 inches tall and 20 lbs 12 oz. Right in the 45-46%. She had great fun while we were at the doctor, repeatedly bringing me my bottle of water from the diaper bag, handing it to me, taking it from me, and putting it back in the diaper bag. Ah, the joy of simple pleasures. And they mean even more when I'm anxious about the kids.