We had a GI appt for Cole yesterday. I don’t particularly care for our GI appts. This time we were able to see our original GI doc. He was “too busy” to follow us on a regular basis after a couple of our first original appts and passed us off to his nurse practicioner. She was nice enough, though I feel she didn’t listen to us either. Well, now we’re back to our main guy and he was not amused by Cole’s weight yesterday. The boy has not grown at all in the last six months despite being on high calorie formula. I’m not shocked. He looks a lot smaller than Paige and boys are supposed to be bigger than girls at this age. So he is short and thin. Supposedly your height can not advance unless you have the weight (you need to get wider before you get longer…..am I going to shoot up like a bean stalk soon? :)) So now the GI doc wants to look at digestive problems with Cole. Geez. Eric said “isn’t that what we wanted a long time ago?”. yes. But now here we are almost a year later getting the testing done. We’ll go tomorrow. They are going to look at his pancreas and stomach. My parents asked what they would do if they found something. I didn’t ask. The doctor also said if the results are normal he wants to reconsider the NG tube down the nose for nighttime feeds. I told him there was no way Cole or I would be okay with that. He would rip that tube out in a millisecond. Not to mention that it would kill me to do that to him every night. The doctor said there were long-term outcomes if Cole doesn’t start growing soon. Again I didn’t ask what those were because I was trying to juggle three kids at an appt right at their lunch/naptime. So I’m left with a lot of questions but thankfully GI is on top of things and will be seeing us soon. Oh that’s right…I’m talking about GI…..yeah, they’re not seeing us for another three months!!!!! That’ll potentially be nine months of no growth for Cole. Fantastic.
We started practicing finding Easter eggs today. The kids LOVED it and I am confident they are going to have a blast on Easter. We just need to make sure we have plenty of chocolate to fill those plastic eggs with!!! I was even getting pretty tricky with some eggs and Cole was finding them pretty fast. Paige not so much…but she is more on the CEO level making Cole and Drew find the eggs then rip them out of their hands.
Lastly, Eric and I are going on a date tonight. I know, I know…it’s not even our anniversary!!! We’re just doing it because we can and should!!! Yippee!
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Wider before you get taller? At this rate, I’ll be as tall as the Empire State building in a few months!
How much is Cole weighing these days? I ask, because Cooper has stalled with his weight gain. He has been lingering at 24 pounds for months. The pediatrician acts like it’s no big deal b/c he grew so well his first 18 months. I’m wondering if I should start worrying. Like I don’t have enough to worry about as it is!
BTW, kudos to you for juggling 3 kids at an appointment during nap time. I can’t handle Coop when he’s tired and fussy at the doctor’s office. I’ll remember not to complain next time. Instead I’ll think WWTD (What would Tobie do?)!
I hope you get some answers soon about Cole’s growth. I know you have been battling this for what seems like forever!
Sorry if the question is really stupid. I had a neighbor whose son had hormone growth deficiency. They gave him the hormone and now he’s growing again at a regular rate. I was wondering how you know this is not the case.
The NG-tube debate. they wanted to do them for our little men. They pulled them out in the NICU… what made them think at 12 months old that they would have left them in?!?!?!?!
They ped GI doc took them off the excessively expensive formula for 2 months and put them on regular old whole milk, and they gained 8lbs each, and grew 3 inches. the next 3 months after that, no gain. Went to a new doctor, found out they had a thyroid issue. after that and other issues we have had, I have become a firm believer in second opinion!!
YEAH to a date night!!! You guys soooooo deserve it!! I hope you are bale to enjoy!!!
Sorry to hear the GI apt stunk! Its sooooo frustrating when you feel strongly that something should be done and the “professionals” wait and wait and wait and then…months later are (essentially like) oh yeah……maybe we should do that-
You could have just written a page about our visits with the GI over the last year. I feel your pain. But, yet maybe a tube of some kind would help (not saying that’s the route to go, i’d avoid it if at all possible but maybe it would help). We see our GI tomorrow and after gaining a whopping 4oz in 4mos (that’s with a gj-tube and getting exceedingly more calories than she needs) we seem to have lost a pound in the last 4wks. It’ll be a fun visit. Good luck to you guys tomorrow. What tests are they running?
Hi,
We have weight issues here too. One twin is at least 28 pounds while the other is 21 and at least 2 inches shorter. It is frustrating because he does eat, sometimes more than his bigger brother. Our docs have us on the wait and see plan with reprimands at each appt for his weight. A vicious cycle I guess. Does Cole still have pooping problems (sorry, don’t know how to put it!)? My son poops probably 4 times a day. I think he’s literally pooping out all his food. My bigger twin only poops once a day. We have our 2 year appt coming up and I’m asking all about poop!
Your kids are gorgeous by the way!
Candice
growth hormone issue comes up every now and then. It’s not something we’re keen on pursuing since it requires a shot every day. The tube for nighttime feeds will NEVER work so we’re not pursuing that either. The pooping is a thousand times better even though occasionally he poops out rocks. We were on glycolax but his new formula contains fiber so we stopped the glycolax. The tests they ordered on him are CBC, CMP, celiac comp panel, and fecal elastase. I have not done any research on celiac disease but the doc wanted to rule it out.
Is it at all possible that Cole has malabsorption issues? No one really raised this with Hallie when she was on cow milk based formula since she was gaining, but clearly she had delayed gastric emptying and wicked reflux. When we switched her to the goat milk out of desperation (and a desire to conserve our environment since our paper-towel use was out of control what with all the projectile vomiting), she not only stopped vomiting quite so much (alas, still does it, especially since she has a cold and is teething right now), but she gained a HUGE amount of weight very quickly. That’s when they mentioned that they now believed that she hadn’t be absorbing all of those nutrients from the 30 kcal Pediasure, Nutren and every other concoction we tried. It may be worth an empirical go-round with something other than cow milk based 30 calorie stuff to see what happens. Otherwise, I agree that the HGH might be worth investigating further and totally agree that the tube feeding scenario is one I would only consent to as a last resort and with considerable kicking and screaming. Not only because he’d never tolerate it and then you’d have really big issues to deal with, but also because at least some studies (Suterwala’s out of Baylor, I think) suggest that tube fed kids don’t actually grow any better than non-tubed ones. Sure, there are real reasons to pursue NG and G-tubes for some kids in some circumstances, but from my read (virtually) of Cole’s situation, his does not strike me as one of those.
Keep fighting the good fight!