I've HAD it with teething

I'm at my wits end. The Chubs has been working on her top teeth for weeks now. They have been swollen with her teeth hovering just below the surface and they have decided to make the slowest most agonizing appearance ever. The top teeth are so much worse than the bottom ones, it's ridiculous. We've had flat out refusal and highchair tantrums with solids, painful long bed times that consist of inconsolable fussing, naps that don't last more than about 10-15 min., and just general overall crankiness almost constantly.

Chubadub's Teeth,

Would you PLEASE just come out and break the surface already? If you don't come soon, I think I may admit myself to a mental institute. Don't you realize how ridiculously long you are taking? Haven't you figured out that a child that ALREADY has sensory issues is about the worst type of baby to take your sweet old time with? I would love to stop drugging up my child and get my Failure to Thrive baby to start eating well again. She already has enough in the oral aversion department, we don't need to add sore aching gums to our never ending list of issues. It's a little important, thankyouverymuch.

Smooches,
The Chub's Mom

Hoping for more, but still happy

We just returned from the doc with a cranky little Chub Muffin who is now sleeping soundly in her crib after a very busy and chaotic day.

As you might have read earlier, today has been really off. She was cranky before we even got to the appointment, so you can only imagine how things turned out after she got her immunizations. She was fussing really hard even before they stuck her with the needle. It was not a good scenario.

I was really excited to see how much she weighed. I was thinking she would be over 10 lbs. since last time she weighed in at 8 lbs. 13oz (however, that was with her clothes on including a baby sweatshirt and pants + onesie & diaper). This time she was totally nakey. Since she was about 4 oz behind what she usually eats by this time of day, that didn't help either. Her weight was 9 lbs. 4.5oz. I was bummed. She probably gained a pound since the last weigh-in a month ago since her clothes probably were several ounces of extra weight, and had she eaten normally today she would've weighed in at 9 lbs. 8.5oz, but still the number bummed me out. She is now 21 1/2 inches long which is around what I expected. Don't get me wrong, I love having a tiny little baby that people still think is "brand new" (despite the fact she tracks everything she sees, giggles and smiles and is super interactive). I guess it's hard not to put the blame on myself for her not growing as fast as I think she should be. The doctor keeps telling us she'll catch up and find her own growth curve, however, she has yet to do that. She's still >3% for height and weight (but her head is 5%... I had to laugh at that one).

But on to the positive. She's looking great, very healthy and she scored above average on all aspects (especially social and fine motor skills). Her gross motor skills are only slightly behind which include having better head control and being able to push herself up for longer than 5 seconds without letting her head crash to the floor. I attribute this to her loathing for tummy time. I think once she starts liking that more, she'll make more progress. Right now all she can think about is how she can get out of it (rolling over would be a great solution but she's just not there yet). I talked to our pediatrician about swaddling as well, and he says it's fine to still swaddle until she's done with it and that it won't delay her development. That made me feel so much better! He also gave us the green light to introduce solids. I'm not sure we'll be jumping on that right away, but probably within the next month. We have some trips coming up and dealing with solids would just throw one extra thing in the mix to remember to bring and deal with while we are there.

So that's about it. I'm praying she'll take a good nap and not wake up howling like she did last time. Not fun, not fun at all.