Monday 28 January 2013

Growth and Sizes

Infants grow SO fast. Many times have I hid some outfit because it was WAYYY to big ("no way he won't fit in this for ages") next thing I know well its almost to small. This happened a few days ago. I was putting on a sleeper for bedtime on Alek and had decided to try one on that 2 weeks ago had been huge on him. My thought process went like this : "well it will probably still be huge on him but the other ones I like are dirty and this one is so cute. Plus he may have grown a bit." Well to my surprise it was JUST right if I had waited another 2 weeks or so it would have been too small. Meanwhile, just approximately 2 weeks (maybe 3) it was huge, meaning his feet not only did not go into the feet part of the sleeper but were dangling way up there. UHMM.... WHAT!? How is that even possible!!! I mean I know infants grow a lot and fast but when something like this happens (and it has happened quite a lot) it just shocks me each time.

  Infants normally grow extremely fast in weight and height the first 2 or 3 months then start slowing down. I think something like an inch a month in the beginning (sometimes more sometimes less) and more like 1 cm ( more or less, each baby differs) after 6 months a month. My son has slowed down but only a tiny bit he is STILL growing approximately 3 centimeters a month. WOW that's awesome but even knowing this you don't seem to really grasp this concept until you see his clothes shrink so fast and NO it is NOT your washing machine (usually).



What has often happened for me is that I do not regularly go through the bags of "too big" clothing and have them hidden somewhere. Well when Alek was small I found out when he was approximately 4 weeks that I had forgot about half the 0-3 month clothing in a bag! Ooops, thankfully he still had about 2 weeks to wear that stuff! Or sometimes I think that he doesn't need the next size up yet but turns out some of the next size up can already have been worn. It tends to be forgotten that each brand seems to make slightly different size clothing for the same sizes. For example, Walmart clothing is for shorter chunkier babies, carters seems to run pretty big, Gymboree runs big (and their clothing though more expensive keeps the colour and holds up beautifully even after many washes), meanwhile children's place seems to run slightly smaller (or maybe I'm wrong don't take me up on it, brands seems to be mixing up in my head). Old Navy also runs pretty small at least height wise. So a tip is not to put away everything of one size just because one thing doesn't fit. Put things away as you see the particular item get small even if (and it does happen) one item from an outfit still fits the second piece may be small....well unless you have a lot of spare money for A LOT of clothing or were gifted a lot. Go through your big size bags every few weeks and a good idea if you have room in the closet or dresser is to keep the next size up ready in the dresser/closet already so you don't forget about them and maybe your child will already fit in some of the items. My son now is wearing some 3-6 still (very few), mostly 6-12, pretty much no 6-9 (hate that size, it was useless for my son), and some 6-12 is getting small so in the smaller brands some 12-18 will be coming out soon. Also keep in mind brands like what is sold in Sears that have weights instead of months are ALSO not exact I have one sleeper that said 16 pounds my son is almost 19 and still fits in it height and length wise so I'm not sure what 16 pound baby it is made for.

      A tip to those who have not yet given birth. Pick a spot or thing beside/on which you take a monthly photo of your child so that you see the growth clearly. I take photos of Alek on his Fisher Price Infant - Toddler Rocker...another good idea is beside a big stuffed toy. Also there are cool stickers that say how many months baby is that you stick onto their onsie for the photo, these stickers can be bought on Etsy or Amazon or probably even Ebay, just search up "baby month milestone stickers" or something similar. On Etsy they cost approximately $10 Canadian.

Anyways if you are worried about your child's weight or height percentile as many moms are the important thing is that the growth curve stays approximately the same (or the percentile gets higher) if its dropping each month then your doctor will mention what to do, often if your child is over 4 months they recommend adding in a bit of iron fortified rice cereal. If your child is younger they may say to supplement with a bit of formula a few times a day. I'm not a doctor so if your worried always talk to your pediatrician about any of your concerns. If they brush your concerns off maybe get a second opinion if you think they are wrong or you truly do think there is a problem? Most likely there is no problem and your child may just be a "slow starter" for growth or is just a small baby. Babies do come in all different shapes and sizes and some babies always make up the top percentiles while some make up the bottom percentiles and it does not mean there is anything wrong.

A good website for growth in breastfed babies, parenting, health and other information website is KellyMom

A pretty good American growth website is http://www.cdc.gov/growthcharts/2000growthchart-us.pdf

Personally I like to google Infant growth percentiles and not look and follow a chart line since I like tables more or the information directly. Though these are more Babycentre type websites not WHO, government or other official websites of the like.

A good explanation of which charts to use and what measurements will be taken at well baby check ups is given by: http://www.parents.com/toddlers-preschoolers/development/physical/chart-child-growth/

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