Nick’s 15 Month Well Visit
It is amazing how fast three months can come and go. When we made Nick’s 15 month well visit appointment back in April the end of July seemed so far away, but not only is it here but it’s almost August. This past Thursday was the day of Nick’s 15 month well visit. I had been looking forward to it somewhat because I was dying to know how Nick was measuring up. At his allergy appointment a month before he had still only weighed 19lbs 7oz, and I wasn’t sure if he had finally hit 20lbs or not.
Thursday morning went very well. We got lucky because Nick was pretty tired, so he crashed early for his nap. He had practically fallen asleep in his lunch! In fact he was so tiered that I had to wake him up, three hours later, so that he could have his snack before we headed out.
When we got to the doctor’s office we had to wait about five minutes or so in the waiting room. Of course Nick wanted to walk all over, and at one point he even grabbed his blankie off of the diaper bag and walked around carrying it. Not surprisingly he got a lot of, “oh, you’re so cute,” looks.
Luckily we were called back before he hit a fussy point (he wasn’t in the best mood since we had woken him up). Once we got into the room the nurse set about getting his measurements. The scale really didn’t want to settle on one number, but we finally went with 20lbs 3oz. Yay Nick! Next the nurse measured him. A month before he had been 31 inches, but baby measurements are not an exact science, and Nick’s measurements are often off and at most well visits he gets measured twice. Still I needed some clarification when the nurse said he was 13 inches. We’re guessing she was just reading the tape measure backwards, but I don’t think she ever realized what she had said. She did decide to measure Nick again, and decided he was 31.25 inches. Last she measured his head which was 18.75 inches ( the same as 3 months before).
We had a little wait between when the nurse left and when the doctor came in, but it wasn’t too long and Nick was mostly happy. Once she came in we went over Nick’s measurements again and his eating habits. She said that his height was in the 53% and that his weight was in the 3% (no wonder 12 month shorts don’t stay up). She had a very slight concern that Nick’s weight percentile has slowly decreased at every appointment since he was born. When we went over what Nick eats though she wasn’t concerned any more and we all agreed that he just burns it off well (especially now that he’s so mobile). She was very happy to hear that we had gotten rid of the bottles and that Nick was drinking a lot of whole milk. She did want to know if Nick was using a spoon yet. I told her that we had done hand over hand spoon feeding a few times, but that Nick hadn’t shown a desire to do it himself.
Next we discussed Nick’s mental and physical development. We went over what words he knows. We told her that many words come and go, and that currently his favorite word is “yeah.” She asked us if Nick was running all over. We told her no, but she wasn’t concerned at all. Especially since Nick had developed so many physical skills (regular sitting up, pulling up, cruising furniture, crawling, and walking from one person to another) since his 12 month well visit. She was very impressed when we told her how much Nick likes to sit and look through books. She also wanted to know if Nick could stack blocks. He’s never played with blocks before, but we were able to tell her that he could put together and take a part Legos (the big toddler size ones).
Overall it was a very good well visit. We ended it with Nick getting two shots. Surprisingly the shots really upset him. Usually he doesn’t mind the shots too much. He actually should have had three, but there is a current shortage of the DTaP shot (each location is only getting 5 a month). He’s had 3 doses already, so he should be ok. Hopefully he’ll get it at his 18 month well visit in October.