Hadley had her seven-year doctors appointment Thursday. Here are her stats from the appt:
Height: 121.9 cm or 4′ (53th percentile)
Weight: 58 lbs 3.2 oz (80th percentile)
BMI: 17.76 (86th percentile)
Blood Pressure: 90/60
Pulse: 110
After the nurse measured Hadley’s height, weight, and blood pressure, we saw our doctor. Unlike previous appointments, we had a few things to discuss with the doctor. So after his exam and questioning of Hadley’s habits and skills, we brought up our concerns. The first was a bump she has on the back of her knee. He said it’s just a small wart and wrote a prescription for this “magic wart cream” that was created by a pharmacy out in Clackamas. Medication to be applied topically to the wart and it should go away with a few weeks.
Secondly, we have had a few issues with random vomiting (with Hadley already having a very sensitive gag reflex, this added up to more vomiting than I was comfortable calling “normal”) that were not accompanied with any other issues. No fever, no flu, no cold. She would throw up once and go on like it never happened. He asked her some diet-related questions (eating spicy foods, too much food before bed, drinking chocolate milk, etc.) and speculated that it was likely due to the caffeine in the chocolate milk, Hadley’s drink of choice, and asked her to limit it to once a week or for special occasions. He also asked her about her bowel movements (thankfully, this no longer something I am involved in). He said that whenever she pooped at home she should have me look at it and, showing me a chart on “types of poop,” see if it looked normal. I assured him that Hadley could certainly tell him what her own poop looks like. She quickly looked at the chart and declared, “I always have ‘deer poops’ like number 1.” He said that solved that matter and she is severely constipated and needs to start taking MiraLAX daily until she can be more of a “number 4” on the chart. And the poop talk just keeps on coming!
Our final issue was with bedwetting (or the clinical term of “nocturnal enuresis”). Hadley is such a deep sleeper that she is unable to wake herself up at night to use the bathroom. We weren’t worried about it, knowing she would outgrow it eventually, and the doctor assured us it’s perfectly normal and that as many as 15% of seven-year-olds have the issue. He said it just becomes a concern when the child is embarrassed or ashamed to wear a pull-up (usually when around others, like at a sleepover). Hadley said she doesn’t want to have accidents anymore and so we decided it was time to take action. He said they have had great success with the bedwetting alarms that teach the child, through a Pavlovian response, to wake up to use the bathroom. Hadley was really excited and we went home and ordered one right away.
Despite all of our questions and concerns, the doctor assured us that Hadley is perfectly normal and healthy. He gave her a clean bill of health. She got a flu shot from the nurse and we were good to go until next year!
