4 Month Check Up

Ziggy had his 4 month checkup with his new doctor on Thursday, March 11. Here are the highlights:

He now weighs 16 lbs 7 oz (~80% percentile) and measures 26.5 inches long (~90%)!

She checked his mouth and doesn't think he's teething yet.

She thought that he has probably outgrown the reflux by now and could safely discontinue the Prevacid but said I could keep him on the same dose until 6 months just in case, as which point he will definitely have outgrown the dose, and I can just stop it.

This new doctor wanted him to start solids (namely rice cereal), working up to 1/4 cup twice a day, then add a mixed grain cereal that includes wheat before 5 months (to reduce the risk of wheat allergy), and then add fruits and vegetables (trying each for 3 days to make sure he doesn't have an allergic reaction). However, on the recommendation of my pediatrician friend, I've decided to hold off on solids until 6 months.

His head is becoming slightly flattened on the left side because since birth he's always preferred to look to the left (must have been the way he was lying in the womb), so the doctor said I should minimize the time he spends lying on his back or sitting with his head resting against something, and should increase his tummy time and encourage him to turn his head to the right as much as possible. She also said I should work on stretching the sides of his neck to prevent over tightening one side and the possible need for physical therapy. We bought him a bebePod seat so he can sit without his head resting against anything. It's supposed to help him learn to sit upright on his own, and so far, he seems to like it. It also helps him to have bowel movements, so it's sort of like his first potty training seat. Any time he seems to be straining to go, I just plop him in the seat, and it does seem to speed up the process.

I asked her about his seemingly constant straining to have a bowel movement, and she seemed to think that introducing solids would help alleviate the problem (I'm not convinced though and wonder if the rice cereal would make him constipated and make things worse--she said to give him prunes if that happens). I'm still planning on waiting on the solids for now.

As for sleeping through the night, when I told her that he'd gone all night (as long as 12 hours!) without eating a few times, she said that now that he's shown he can do it (and since he's clearly gaining enough weight), that I should no longer feed him at night. Well, I've already screwed that up--it's just too hard to let him cry, especially knowing that he's probably hungry, and especially when I touch his face and and it's wet and I realize he's crying real tears. He's back to eating twice a night now, and usually wakes up a third time as well, where I rock him back to sleep. The rocking isn't as effective as it used to be--it takes longer and sometimes doesn't work at all.

I asked her about his fear of strangers (he recently started crying when new people come up to him, especially if they get really close, which is unlike his formerly really friendly behavior), and she said that normally stranger fear doesn't develop until 9 months, so maybe his personality is just showing. She said I should try to introduce him to new people as much as possible. I really hope he doesn't end up shy like I was as a child!

He had his vaccines again, and this time he didn't vomit up the Rota virus vaccine (although he did have a huge projectile vomit later at home--wonder if it was related to the vaccine?), and he cried less and recovered more quickly from the shot vaccines, although he was understandably a bit fussier for the rest of the day again. Well, that's all for now. He's already changed so much from my previous post--I'll try to post again for 5 months (yeah, we'll see if that actually happens!).