Small 1 year old

[adrie]

Hey All,

Just wondering if anyone has babies who grew slowly? My baby was about 6.5 lbs at birth and 19.5 inches and weighed in at 15.12 lbs and 27 inches just before 11 months. She will be 12 months on the 20th of October. She was in the 5th centile for weight and the 10th for height.

I ask because our family physician has been concerned since she was a month old because she was not maintaining the 50th percentile for which she was born on. In truth, she has slowly dropped throughout the months and has had no drastic dips in weight or height. She maintained the 25th percentile until 3 months, and then maintained mostly the 10th in height and weight from 4 months until 11.

We STRUGGLED to formula feed her pretty much from birth; according to the doctor, she was NEVER eating enough. She did not want to eat how much he thought she would be; our lives were consumed with trying to get in as much as possible. And it was a STRUGGLE to get her to consume more than 24oz in 24 hours until the day we started weaning onto food at 6 months and beyond.

The doc finally referred us to his own wacky ped at 6 months; we never got an appt. until 9 months old and she had only gained about 6 oz from 6-9 months. She was super sick for a few days at 7 months and was consuming only half as much formula as normal. So she probably lost weight she didn't have to lose.

We did blood work and a stool sample. The blood work came back normal but the doc said there was fat in her stool. So def not a good thing at all! But the wrong thing here is that we never received a call about the fat in the stool until 1.5 months had passed, and only until 2 days after I made a followup appt. So that was unacceptable in my opinion. Regardless, we went into the appt. and my baby had gained 1.5 lbs in a month and a half. So pretty good. But he flippantly mentioned CF and ordered another stool sample. Like really? If there is fat in the stool--why do we have to find it repeatedly? And to mention CF like it is any random issue is not cool. I have been beside myself with worry and concern.

But her stool is all over the place. Sometimes bulky, sometimes floating, sometimes normal, more pasty, etc. Lately it's been better I think. More normal. Bulky/floating stools are not okay. I know ALL about that. I think she has also had rare episodes of oily anal leakage.

Regardless, he mentioned that she didn't have celiac from the blood work; but it is my understanding that those results are not necessarily 100% conclusive until she is older, maybe even 2 years old.

Suffice it to say, I still did the second stool sample which came back clear. We actually went to the hospital and I was referred to a new ped who we have seen once already. She has done a lot more thorough of a first appt. than the 2 or 3 with the other guy. We are not going back to him.

I literally log everything she eats/drinks and have mostly been doing that for nearly 3 months. Just in case they are concerned she is not being fed/offered enough.

This was her diet yesterday:

4:30am 2 oz formula
8:30am 4 oz formula
9am breakfast: 4 tbsp. baby wheat & yogurt cereal made with homo milk instead of water and 3/4 banana

1pm 6 oz formula
1:30 pm Lunch 2 oz baked fish and 1/4 cup raspberries. Sips of water w super diluted juice (like 1 part juice to 7 parts water--just for a bit of flavour). I usually also offer grains & veg w lunch/dinner but dad was feeding her and did not.

5pm 5 oz formula
6pm Dinner: 2 oz Turkey dinner (mix of turkey, potato, stuffing, veg) and 2 oz pumpkin spice puree for dessert. Sips of water usually too.

The amounts of what she eats varies from day today, but I have actually increased her formula intake. She was taking 10-12 oz with three meals per day, and now that amount has increased to an average of 16-18 oz on average, sometimes 20+oz! So that makes me super happy. With food, we just feed her until she doesn't want it, plays with it, pushes away, etc.

I still ALWAYS indulge night feedings because of growth concerns obviously and also b/c she pretty much never takes a bottle before bed, and if she does, 3-4 oz would be considered a lot. Typically about 1 oz consumed at that time.



Really looking forward to our followup appt. with the ped on the 28th of this month.

 

[zorak]

It sounds like you've been messed around by your doc, I'm glad you are seeing someone else.

 

[MindUtopia]

Sorry you've been through such a rough time and hopefully you get some answers soon. My daughter has also always been on the smaller side (25th centile at birth). I'm not sure what she weighs now, but she can still fit into some 9-12 month clothes at 20 months, though she's not dropped in centiles, only gone up even if she's on the smaller side. My only suggestion would be possibly trying to move away from 'baby food' towards real adult food, which should be higher in fat and calories than the pureed stuff. Will she eat finger foods? It could be she just isn't interested in the puree and you might find it's easier to add fat and calories to regular foods by adding butter and cheese to just about everything. You can melt butter into porridge and real porridge will be heartier than the baby rice. You could offer things like cheese sandwiches or peanut butter and a tiny bit of jam on a sandwich, etc. Even if she was still only eating say 2oz, it should be more calorie dense. I think you're doing exactly the right thing keeping her formula up if she isn't eating much, but I'd think about maybe starting to offer food first if she'll take it and then top up with formula after if she's happy to do that and it doesn't cause any issues (like as long as she doesn't decrease the formula while still not eating much). I know at about a year or so, offering milk first meant my daughter wouldn't eat as much, but she would happily eat loads of food if offered it first. Might be worth a try. But really hope you get some answers soon!

 

[adrie]

Thanks for the support/input, both of you.

To the second poster. I would def offer food before formula, but we have tried that and she refuses more and more formula. She will literally take 10-12 oz of formula and not even one bottle of water or milk, etc., and then she ends up constipated from not enough liquid consumption and not wetting enough diapers. I can use today as an example. I left the house for half a day at the noon hour and brought her lunch formula bottle and got us lunch; ended being out a bit too late and offered her a pack and a half of fruit/veg puree (5-6oz) to tide her over. And when we got home, she wouldn't even take a bottle, not a sip of it. So now she will likely be up no later than midnight for a feed, and that is fine. But that is typical in terms of any food before formula type scenario.

She does eat a lot. Her favourites are boiled egg, all fruit, cheese, meats, plain full fat greek yogurt, and pasta & bread. I use a bit of butter for cooking or adding to veg, rice, etc., after cooking, and drizzle EVOO into things like yogurt, baby cereal, etc. I will grate cheese onto things like veggies, eggs w toast 7 spinach, etc. I only chunky puree something if I cook it for dinner and she won't eat it fresh off the tray. (And also to get more veg into her). Like for instance, I make stir-fry with veg, meat and rice, and she will only eat meat and toss everything else off the tray. Give her a really chunky puree, and I can get her to eat 1/2-3/4 of a cup per meal. I will definitely try heartier oatmeal more often, she has had that and she loves it!

We actually think she has gained since her appt on Sept. 20. Going to keep going the course here and report back after. I'd be ECSTATIC if she was 17+ lbs @ 1 year old! (That would mean she gained 3+ pounds in 3 months), which is pretty good for her!

 

[minties]

For starters, 6.5 (as is 6lbs, 8oz?) pounds is the 25th centile for a newborn girl. So there was no big drop at the start.

Sophie went down a centile at 3 months. She has been up and down centiles in weight and length.

It sounds like your daughter has a healthy appetite?

I was always tiny, 3rd centile for weight and length in the 1980s then dropped off the charts by age 4. There was nothing wrong, I was just small.

I was 2.6kg at birth and about 7kg at a year old (so started out just above 5th and ended up below 3rd at one year according to today's charts).

 

[adrie]

For starters, 6.5 (as is 6lbs, 8oz?) pounds is the 25th centile for a newborn girl. So there was no big drop at the start.

Sophie went down a centile at 3 months. She has been up and down centiles in weight and length.

It sounds like your daughter has a healthy appetite?

I was always tiny, 3rd centile for weight and length in the 1980s then dropped off the charts by age 4. There was nothing wrong, I was just small.

I was 2.6kg at birth and about 7kg at a year old (so started out just above 5th and ended up below 3rd at one year according to today's charts).

I guess I should live in the UK. You have smaller babies there. According to the charts they use in Canada, my daughter was 6lb, 9oz @ birth, 19.5 inches (3.12 kg) which falls on the 50th centile.

My daughter has had a rather slow, but consistent decline, and at 11 months had almost fallen right off the charts. 7.1kg at that time.

She seems to have a really good appetite; I suppose I was just looking to vent about frustrations with the medical community.

I have a friend who had a daughter 3 days after I had my LO who was was checked for the same concerns and turned out to be a pound bigger at 11.5 months (17lbs). And there has been no mention of CF to her at all! She only had blood and urine sampled; no stool samples like my LO, etc., and it's not like my LO isn't developing mentally and physically, either. I dunno, just seems a bit odd to me. And instead of worrying me, why didn't we just test for CF right away? I don't get it...

 

[minties]

I live in New Zealand, not the UK. We follow the World Health Organisation charts here, do you?

I get 6lbs 9oz to convert to 2.98kg? Not 3.12kg. My kids were 3.3kg and 3.6kg so I don't think we have teeny weeny babies, hehe, just I was small. I'm still pretty short.

2.9kg is the 25th centile on the WHO charts. The length works out to be 50th centile so I agree with you there (inches and pounds are so confusing, argh!).

Your daughter looks pretty well proportioned on the charts? Looks like 5th centile for length (68.5cm is 5th for 11 months) and somewhere around 1st-3rd for weight but I am unsure about the 15.12 pounds meaning 15lbs 12oz (7.14kg) or actually 15.12lbs (6.68kg), as people seem to use that interchangeably on here.

Yes, she is small, but not disproportionately so as her weight and height are so close in centiles.

My daughter was about that height at 11 months also. She is still short at almost 2.

I understand your vent, vent ahead .

https://i1345.photobucket.com/albums/p666/teddynorman/girlslength_zpsdb60938b.jpg

https://i1345.photobucket.com/albums/p666/teddynorman/girlsweight2_zps43764ab8.jpg

 

[adrie]

I use the WHO growth charts with Dieticians Canada. Seems like all of these charts vary. The new ped used an electronic chart that plotted her numbers--15lb, 12 oz and 27-27.5 height and she stated she was 5th for weight and 10th for height. I think she has grown since then, and we are so happy! My mom is always like "who cares if she is small" And I just said "I don't care about that; I just want her to keep growing!" (since we had a three month period with only 6 oz gained from 6-9 months!)

Thankfully she is very proportionate! We CANNOT keep her still; haven't been able to do that since she started crawling, and now she is constantly cruising, crawling and bouncing around everywhere, getting into everything like a healthy babe should. So it's no wonder that once we started weening and she dropped 2 bottles, she is just burning off all her calories!

 

[minties]

The WHO charts don't vary, they shouldn't anyway. The charts have been the same for many years. I think that people just plot on them wrong or don't convert to or from metric properly. Including nurses and doctors! Sophies well child nurse always plots her length wrong so I go back and fix it once she has left. She had me taking Sophie to the doctor worrying about her growth as she was measuring her length on the 75th centile rather than the 5th that it actually was.

She does sound very well and healthy to me you are doing a great job with her.

 

[catty]

It seems like your daughter does eat quite a bit and maybe is just going to be a petite girl.
My son was always at the very top of the charts and I always told to cut out milk. One hv at 6 months old told me to put all his milk into sippy cups so that he'd at least drop 1 or 2. He was only a little baby
My daughter is breastfed and dropped from between the 50th and 75th centile to the 25th, iv already had discussions of how I need to feed her longer and more regularly every time I go. Iv stopped listening now as I feel she is just little and not worryingly so.

 

[adrie]

The WHO charts don't vary, they shouldn't anyway. The charts have been the same for many years. I think that people just plot on them wrong or don't convert to or from metric properly. Including nurses and doctors! Sophies well child nurse always plots her length wrong so I go back and fix it once she has left. She had me taking Sophie to the doctor worrying about her growth as she was measuring her length on the 75th centile rather than the 5th that it actually was.

She does sound very well and healthy to me you are doing a great job with her.

Hmmm, well when we went to the hospital, even the doctor told us to use the same chart every time. And I know that when we go to see the nurses, they plot her on a different chart than whatever it was my family physician used as well.

But thanks so much. I went to the nurse's (health services spot) yesterday as there are weight tables and I don't think I weighed her in the right position as we received two different weights (one stating 6.83kg and then the second stating 7.2 something). She was pushing her feet on the plastic bar and now thinking of it, I think I should have had her head against the plastic piece with her feet outward in the opposite direction b/c she could have been setting off the scale, lifting her weight and causing extra resistance somehow. Suffice it to say that I hope to god she has gained and she isn't still 7.2 or whatever-- which is 15lb, 12.5 oz. I feel like this kid is never going to hit 20lbs, it's ridiculous.

If that is her weight, that essentially means she has gained a WHOPPING 2 lbs from 6 months to 1 year old!!! I'm not sure but this cannot be good. Even if she's just gained 4 (having lost a lb or two already from all the activity) I'd be happy.

I'm just so discouraged; I feel like she has been eating more formula and still taking a decent amount of food. It does seem like the more formula she takes in, the bulkier her stools are, though.

 

[adrie]

It seems like your daughter does eat quite a bit and maybe is just going to be a petite girl.
My son was always at the very top of the charts and I always told to cut out milk. One hv at 6 months old told me to put all his milk into sippy cups so that he'd at least drop 1 or 2. He was only a little baby
My daughter is breastfed and dropped from between the 50th and 75th centile to the 25th, iv already had discussions of how I need to feed her longer and more regularly every time I go. Iv stopped listening now as I feel she is just little and not worryingly so.

It's kind of ridiculous isn't it? It seems like the babies are not even given the chance to develop their own curve before the doctors or hv start harping on about weight and feeding, and dropping centiles. I don't know about everyone else's baby, but if my LO is done at 5 or 6 oz, she's done. She will push it away, cause a fuss, and that is it. Same with food. I wish food interested my little one just HALF as much as playing, exploring, and moving around!! She's always got at least one eyeball peeled to something more interesting even in the highchair.

I have seriously felt in the past that I am so consumed with feeding properly and always having adequate food on hand, that I'm consumed by it, not going out as much, etc. etc. I don't think a lot of these medical professionals realize that it's not automatically the parents' doing, or lack thereof.

 

[minties]

I'm so sorry . I wish I had something helpful to say, I'm facing the opposite problem of my almost 2 year old being 'obese' right now. She is gaining 170 grams a week which is way too much but she eats a normal amount. Some days she doesn't even ask for food at all.