A the Midget

Yesterday we took A in for his four month check-up, and he's completely fallen off the charts. He's offiically in the zero percentile for his weight. It still weirds me out to have a child that's so skinny. Not that D or B2 was terrible chunky, but they were just big all around -- tall and appropriately heavy. So, to have this kid that's short and skinny is odd. Don't get me wrong--I love having a baby that stayed a baby for more than a week (I swear B2 could officially pass as a toddler at 2 months old), but I can't help but worry about A constantly. The pediatrician isn't terribly worried--developmentally he is on track or even advanced; for example, he's been rolling front-to-back and back-to-front since shortly after he turned two months old. However, the dr did recommend that we try to fatten him up by introducing rice cereal now. So far, A loves it! Today was his second day, and he's already discovered that if he removes his hands from his mouth (which he rarely does at any time of the day, but especially when feeding as he uses his hands to create suction so the food can go down), Mommy will put in the spoon with more food! I was so proud of him to discover this fact so quickly!

So, the pediatrician's plan is for us to try and fatten A up with some rice cereal. In 4 weeks we will take him back to the doctor's office and re-weigh him. If A has gained at least a pound, that will put him back on track (I think that will bump him back to the 5th percentile). If not, the doctor said there are a few tests he'd like to run, just to make sure we don't have anything to worry about. He said that 90% of the time, skinny kids are just skinny because they burn more calories than they consume. And since my brother's kids are also skinny kids, our pediatrician is fairly sure that A just got that high metabolism. Here's hoping we see a whopping 11 pounds, 4 ounces on that scale come mid-November!

Incidentally, shortly before the doctor's appointment, D decided to give A a nickname--"A the Midget!" Quite apropos, D!