The Journey of Parenthood…

Tess’s 6 Month Well Visit

Having one child makes scheduling things pretty easy…but now that we have three? It’s much more difficult to schedule everything and not have stuff overlap. I’ve really had to accept that this is going to happen, and it’s going to happen often. Praise the LORD for a super mega involved husband who can arrange his schedule to divide and conquer with me. And further praise for my ammmmmazing mother in law who can help us pick up the slack on days we just can’t conquer on our own!!! It takes a village and my village is awesome 🙂

Tess’s 6 month well check fell on the same morning as Kye’s Muffins with Mom. I’ll be honest: I wanted to be at Tess’s appointment. I had a LOT of questions and I have such a comfortable relationship with the staff at their office that I just wanted to be the one there. However, I knew that Kye’s Muffins with Mom was where I HAD to be. Tess doesn’t know I missed her appointment, but Kye would know if I missed his. And these days Tess’s needs tend to come first so I wanted to make sure Kye had his special Mommy time! 

Zach took Kye to school and I took the girls to the appointment. I didn’t have to be at his school for our even until a little later so I was hoping to at least get some of the appointment done with me there. Turns out they got called back exactly when I was having to leave! 

Both girls did so awesome in the waiting room!

Sidenote: the stuffed animal Britt has was mine as a kid and we have a family debate going about it…is it SIMBA or NALA? (#teamnala)

She kept checking on her sister 🙂

I talked to Zach about the importance of the appointment and apologized in advance for my hardcoreness about stuff haha. I totally sent him in there with a notebook that had my questions written out and big spaces for him to fill in the answers. No joke. I felt like I was tossing the poor guy to the wolves. I mean he had BOTH girls AND Tess had to miss her nap for the appointment. 

While I had my hesitations about doing it, I’m really glad Zach handled it solo. Not only did he ROCK OUT at the visit (I’m sure the staff will be bragging on him when I go back for Tess’s 9 month check up!) but he got a TRUE taste of what I do. I think so often Dad’s think they know what it’s like for us moms but when they watch the kids they don’t keep the house spotless, feed healthy meals, and avoid tv. So it’s not a real taste of “mom life.” This dr appointment? It was a true look at how things are as a mom. Trying to keep a preschooler entertained, trying to get an infant to sleep, trying to remember all the questions you need to ask the dr…it’s a lot and I think he had a new appreciation for how I handle it on a regular basis 🙂 

On top of managing the appointment…the guy even took pics. I mean HELLO I found me a keeper!

First up her stats! At her 6 month visit (Feb 10th) Tess was 26 3/4 inches long which is the 85th percentile. She was also 14 lbs 8 oz which is the 25th percentile. Her head was 16.5 inches which is the 20th percentile. At her last visit (4 months old) she was 25 inches long (75th percentile), 13/ 2 lbs (25th percentile) and her head was 15.6 inches (25th percentile). I was very happy to see her growth! Having a smaller baby is a little more worrisome than when I had larger babies! 

At Britt’s same visit she was 17.3 lbs (55th percentile), 27 inches long (50th percentile), 16.5 inch head circumference (24th percentile). I don’t get how Britt was longer yet in a smaller percentile? Maybe they changed the percentiles since then? I looked it up online and it says her length is 75th percentile, weight is between 10th and 25th and head is 25th. So maybe I had Britt’s wrong! I can’t believe they are so close in their lengths. Tess seems SO much smaller than Britt was!!! She doesn’t seem “long” to me at all and is still in such smaller sizes. The dress Britt was wearing at her 6 month visit is a 6-12 months, Tess’s outfit for this visit is a 3 month! 

At Kye’s same visit he was 18.14 lbs (75th percentile), 28 inches long (90th percentile), and 17.5 inches head circumference (50th percentile) So far Kye is def the biggest baby we’ve had! 

Here are all the questions I had and the answers to them:

  • Do we need to give the MMR vaccine earlier due to the measles outbreak? The PA said she needs to talk to the pediatrician about that. The earliest children can have the MMR is 12 months and they may need to move it to the 12 months due to the outbreak.
  • Tess has a lump in her left breast, I assumed it’s normal but had them check it. Yes, totally normal!
  • We had just started solids with Tess (post to come) and I don’t use cereal with my babies. I know Casey’s dr said Carter needs the iron from the cereal so I wanted Zach to ask about that. I think the question got lost in translation as she said to make sure we are doing the vitamin d drops still and that she’s fine to go ahead and have cereal. So I need to re-ask this at next visit. Those of you who don’t do cereal, do you worry about iron?
  • I noticed going through my blog posts that Tess’s stats dropped in percentiles from her 2 month visit to her 4 month one. They were back up at this visit but I wanted Zach to ask and they said she’s healthy and comes from a home where they know she’s getting everything she needs and that she may just be a smaller baby, petite like her mama
  • They looked at Tess’s flat spot and said it’s fine and should fix itself here soon now that she’s sitting more
  • Britt needed her ears checked after having an ear infection at her last appointment. She said her ears looked great and perfect again!
  • I also had him ask about Britt’s belly button. I forgot to ask at her appointment. She has an “outie” that they told us is an umbilical hernia. She said when she looked at it that it looks better and that we’ll continue to watch it this next year. If it’s not gone by her 4 year check up then we may have to look into other options (which I’ve never really googled about this…I just did and ummm it could mean surgery. Boo.)
  • I also had Zach show her a picture of Kye’s lip. It was dry and kept cracking and she said it was infected. She prescribed some lip ointment for prevention as well as some for healing if it happens again!

Tess had shots at her visit including DTap, Hib, Hepatitis B, Polio, PCV13. She also got her flu shot. Child was EXHAUSTED after the appointment! 

Zach said both girls did great. He was able to get Tess to sleep a little bit in his arms (hard to do with a well trained baby wise baby!). I’m SO thankful he was able to go and it makes me look at him in a new light with new appreciation 🙂 His mom had even offered to go with him and he said no, that he wanted to handle it solo. They are his kids and he can take care of them just fine 🙂 

You can see Britt’s 6 month well visit here and Kye’s here!

Emily Parker
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