The Journey of Parenthood…

Britt 4 Year Old Well Visit and Tess 18 Month Old Well Visit

The last few times Tess has had a well visit I’ve taken her solo…which means shots solo…which is basically miserable for me and I worry it will affect Tess and her ability to be tough for shots in the future. When they scheduled her 18th month well visit I put it in BOLD on the calendar to make sure Zach knew not to schedule anything for work during that time period! I also looked and realized Britt’s 4 year well visit was the day prior. Even though I realllllly didn’t want to combine them (I regretted combining Kye’s 4 year visit with Britt’s 15 month one, remember?) it just made sense to do them both at the same time and since Zach would be there we’d handle it 🙂

Then Zach found out he had a mandatory meeting the same day as their appointment. Ugh of course! I basically freaked (which I shouldn’t have, gotta trust my man to handle things) and then Zach worked it out where he could come as long as we could knock the shots out as quickly as possible so he could get to his meeting. 

I very rarely have concerns going into well visits. But this visit? I was nervous. I think a lot of it had to do with it being Britt’s 4 year visit and it’s the same visit that we started the whole journey of Kye’s growth delay mess. I was also nervous about Britt’s weight. She’s just SO SKINNY and I was nervous that maybe she’s lost weight? Her pants legit FALL OFF. 

When we got there Zach took Tess to get her stats while I took Britt to do her big kid stuff: hearing and vision tests! 

At her 3 year well visit Britt was 38 inches tall (90th percentile) and 29 pounds (35th percentile).  At 4 she’s 41.5 inches tall (76th percentile) and 34.5 lbs (45th percentile). Just in comparison to Kye at his 4 year well visit he was 39 inches tall (25th percentile) and 36 pounds (50th percentile). 


Right away just knowing her stats I breathed a sigh of relief. First she grew over 2 inches in this year which means no cause for concern related to growth delay. Second, she gained 5 ½ lbs! She may be skinny, but she’s fine with her weight! 


It’s interesting that Kye was so much shorter but then also almost 2 lbs heavier at this same visit. They have TOTALLY different builds and body types for sure!


At Tess’s 15 month well visit she was 30 inches long (50th percentile) and 20 lbs (10th percentile) . Her head 17.75 inches and in the 25th percentile. At 18 months she is 32 inches tall (51st percentile), 23.5 lbs (48th percentile) and her head was 18.1 (26th percentile).


To compare to her siblings at her 18 month well visit Britt was: 33 inches tall (75th percentile), 23 lbs (25th percentile) and her head circumference was 17.16 inches (10th percentile).


And at his 18 month well visit Kye was: 33 3/4 inches tall (85th percentile), 27.5lb (70th percentile), and 19 inches head circumference (75th percentile).


The comparisons to her siblings do not surprise me ONE BIT. I knew she was our shortest and I also feel like she’s heavier than Britt was. Not only does Tess have more of (an adorable!) baby belly but she just reminds me of Kye and how he always seemed HEAVY. She’s really got that heaviness here in the past couple of months. I also could tell her head was bigger than Britt’s ever was but yet also not as big as Kye’s. She’s right in the middle of them both while also being the shortest 🙂

Here is what we covered in this visit:

  • Both of Britt’s growth and weight looked fine so I didn’t ask too much about them. I did look it up when we got home and she’s in a 5t based on height but a stinking 3t based on weight! I did mention the weight thing and the PA said she’s totally fine and healthy and that don’t we wish we all had that issue of our pants falling off due to being too skinny? haha AMEN
  • My other main concern was about Britt’s belly button. It still sticks out and they have said in the past it’s a hernia. I was told that if by her 4 year well check it hadn’t gone down that she’d probably need surgery. We did see someone different at this visit so I plan to ask to see our normal PA at her 5 year check just to do a double check (since she’s the one who has always seen Britt!) but the one we saw at this visit said it’s fine. She said it’s just an outie belly button and feels normal and fine and isn’t an issue!
  • Britt passed both the vision and hearing tests with no issues. I always am a little nervous for the vision b/c I have TERRIBLE sight and needed glasses pretty young so I’m just waiting for it to be my kids’ turn ha!
  • I did NOT ask about auto immune disease concerns at this visit. I know I always ask but this time I didn’t 😉 Zach’s mom and sister both have auto immune diseases and it’s something I’m concerned about, especially for my daughters. We actually talked to a specialist since Britt’s last well visit just to ask and they said that it’s a 2% chance, even with the family history. Now if Zach had an auto immune disease it’d jump to a 10% chance of our kids having one but since it is a generation removed it’s only 2%. Not too bad! 
  • When it came to Tess I asked about her stools. They have ALWAYS been pretty loose and never really got solid, even with all the regular food she eats. At this point she was still drinking breastmilk in her sippy cup once a day so they agreed to wait it out and see. Once she’s done with the breastmilk we will re-evaluate if her poop hasn’t become more solid. 
  • Both girls had a good bit of shots as well as pricks to check hemoglobin. Both came back with great results and both girls did SO WELL with the shots. The 4 year old shots are no joke and Britt was tough!!!

My main concern with Tess is actually the exact OPPOSITE of the growth delay concerns we had with Kye. She’s had little breasts since birth. We were told it was probably due to my hormones and that it should get better with time. Again, she was still on breastmilk at her 18 month visit so I knew they’d say to continue to wait on it. The new PA did look at them and I also had her look closely at her private area. She has a good bit of fuzz down there and some of it is even dark in color. I noticed it now that we are potty training b/c I’m always watching to see if she goes tee tee!

She did think it was a tad concerning, particularly the hair and we discussed waiting it out until her 2 year well visit in August to re-evaulate to give time for all the breastmilk (my hormones) to be fully out of her system. While the little breasts probably won’t ever go down, they shouldn’t be growing either and I have to keep an eye out as sometimes hormonal issues can cause little girls to have a CYCLE. Omg I’d FREAK if that happened!!!

Is it all concerning? Yes. But it’s also SO interesting to me. Basically what may be going on is the exact opposite thing that happened to Kye. Tess may be developing early and possibly may have an advanced bone age (where your bone age is older than your actual age). I filled the new PA in on all of Kye’s history and let her know how his growth dr told us that Zach most likely had growth delay as well and that I most likely had advanced bone age and that our girls would very likely follow my path with that (you can read more about what she said here!)! Looks like Tess just may be proving her right!

If we feel there is an issue in August we will have blood work done (same as we did for Kye) and go see a specialist in Tallahassee (same specialist we saw for Kye too). Most likely I’ll have them do the blood work (I love that his ruled out the auto immune concerns!) and probably go down to see the specialist for one visit. Assuming it’s all exactly what she predicted I’m sure it’s nothing to be overly concerned about. Most likely she’ll just be like me and start her cycle very young (I was 3rd grade), have to shave very young, and be a shorter adult. Maybe she’ll be short enough to actually wear my wedding dress b/c I have a feeling Britt will be too tall for it 😉

Sidenote but I am straight up FASCINATED by all this growth delay/advanced bone age stuff. Whenever it comes up I go ON AND ON and probably annoy people about it. But I just really think it’s so, so interesting. If I ever get did go back to school I’d love to learn more about it all.

Of course that mama instinct is to be concerned but I’m just not going to even think about any possible issues that could be going on until we re-evaluate in August and even then if she needs to go through everything we did with Kye then we will deal with it when the time comes. Hey, we did love the chance to hit up Krispie Kreme in Tally so I’m sure the kids wouldn’t complain about more visits down there 🙂 

We got prescriptions for more of the things I like to have on hand at home (Bromfed and eye drops) and got both of the girls records for school (yes, we are sending Tess in the fall…more on that in a future post!) and we hit the road! Both girls did GREAT and I’m SO thankful Zach was able to be there with us. He’s SO great at handling shots plus it was def a better divide and conquer situation. I also was very impressed with the new PA and while I’m partial to my fav, I’m looking forward to getting to know her better as well 🙂

As always I’m just SO thankful for healthy babies! We are blessed and we never take that for granted!

You can see Kye’s 18th month well visit here and Britt’s here!

As well as Kye’s 4 year well visit here!


Emily Parker
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