Tuesday, December 15, 2009

2 year checkup

Has anyone seen my brain? I think I left it somewhere between weeks 13 and 26. :)

Addison had her 2 year well-check a couple of weeks ago and just today I realized I had failed to write a post about it!

Addison is now a big doctor fan, as opposed to 15-18 months when she completely freaked out as soon as we hit an exam room. I think it's helped her to accompany me to a few of my OB appointments and see the doctor working on Mommy rather than her. I also believe that the doctor kit she received for her birthday has made her much more comfortable with the typical things doctors do. (Thanks, Jen!)

At her appointment, she was very clear in stating that she did not want to be held by the doctor. The first thing she said when he walked into the room was "Dr. Barrett no hold you." He assured her only Mommy would hold her and she relaxed. She then proceeded to tell Dr. Barrett what he was to do next (look in her ears, throat, nose, etc.) He called her a pro!

She stood on the big girl scale for the first time and weighed in at a whopping 25.5lbs (45th %) and measured 33 3/4 inches (50th %).

Dr. B and I talked about a couple of things that were on my mind, one of them being an issue that Addison has had since serious potty-training began.

STOP here if you don't want to read about my daughters poop issues. It's kinda gross.

For the past couple of months, Addison seemed to be holding in her bowel movements and was only going every 3 or so days, mostly in the potty. This quickly began to cause A LOT of pain for Addison and required several hours of sticking around the house on "poop day", waiting for her to build up enough courage to go.

I knew this was not a good situation and probably wouldn't resolve itself. Dr. B agreed that Addison was probably holding it in because she had developed an aversion to pooping due to the pain that she was enduring. He told me that most 2 years olds don't know the difference between a toilet and a toaster and not to push her into it.

I assured him that I am not pushing and that Addison is more than willing to go on the potty. He thought that was wonderful! At the same time, he thought it best that Addison knew she could go poop in her diaper if that made her more comfortable.

So, I told her this (once) and wouldn't you know that she immediately (and has continued) having having normal, easy bowel movements 1-2 times a day! Most of them are in her diaper at the end of her nap. (And if I don't get to her soon enough, the diaper comes off and....well, you know the rest!) This must be when she is most relaxed and can go with ease. Though over the past couple of days, she has gone a few times in the potty, too, so perhaps we will get back to that one of these days. Until then, poopy diapers are fine with me! Better than having her cling to my neck and cry while pushing out rock-hard poo!

Addison had also, just 2 or 3 days before her appointment, developed a few small red dots on her belly and back. It turned out that she had a staph infection. We don't know how this happened, but it was treated with antibiotics and went away. I am definitely glad we had an appointment that day because I don't think I would have had it checked out until it worsened!

Everything else checked out perfectly.

My favorite was when Dr. B said (almost verbatim) "Well, I see there is not a problem with her language development. At this age, we want to make sure they are putting 2 words together, but Addison is in here talking in paragraphs and telling me short stories." Yes, my girl is a talker. LOVE IT!

My least favorite was when Addison had 3 shots. She was so sad and we left with her saying "Addsin no like Dr. Barrett". Crap! Here's to hoping she doesn't mean it!

3 comments:

Julie said...

A friend of mine's daughter had similar rock hard poo issues when she was potty training and the kid couldn't get over not liking to go so she had to give her 1/2 of a chocolate chewable ex-lax every day so she woudln't get impacted. It lasted until she was almost 5....So I'm glad to hear that Addison is still okay with the diaper! Hannah loves to sit on the potty, but only fully clothed, so we're definitely not at this stage yet : )

jayj211 said...

Ella has the same problem but we can't revert her back to diapers. She's too old! Our doctor put her on Miralax and we give her a quarter of a dose every other day. She used to scream and cry and shake and sometimes there would even be a little blood because they were so hard. Now she poops with ease. It really freaked me out but I've found it's a very common problem with toddlers. Good luck Addison!

Hollywood said...

Yep! we're not potty training yet--but had similar issues. Dr. DiCarlo said just a tsp of milk of magnesia every other day or so in other liquids. Works great for us--but boy does that break your heart. Been there! Merry Christmas to all of you!