Little Man

I'm thinking after Ian's Endocrinologist appointment today I need to come up with a better nickname for him.

If you remember back in January at our first appointment with Dr. Lazono Ian was measuring in the 3rd percentile for his height which was not good. We also had the blood test results showing his IGF-1 levels as being extremely low. The conclusion at the first appointment was to wait 3 months and then re-measure Ian to see if he was growing or not.

When the nurse called us back we stoped at the measuring station and had Ian weighed. In the last 3 months Ian has gained one pound which was great because it means his weight is still progressing normally. Then they measured his height and the nurse turned to Ian's folder before telling us what his height was. After what seemed like 5 minutes (probably only a few seconds) the nurse turned to us and said his height is the exact same as last time.

My heart instantly sank at that moment. I knew based on Ian's clothing fitting the same as when they were purchased that he probably hadn't grown much. I did however think that he would have some growth even if it was a very small amount. I never had my hopes up that this whole thing was a fluke, in fact I have had the thoughts the last 3 months that this appointment would not be good yet I found myself on the verge of crying when the nurse said he was the exact same. It may seem silly to some of you but part of me feels like I have done something wrong. I know that I haven't done anything wrong but I can't help thinking it. I also hate that something is wrong with my baby and I can't fix it with a band-aid and a kiss!

So after the nurse wrote down the numbers in Ian's chart we went to his room. One thing I liked at the first visit was that we didn't have to wait long for the Doctor to come in and it was same this time. When Dr. Lazono opened Ian's chart and read his height measurement he looked very surprised that Ian hadn't grown at all. He still went through all the exam stuff and measured Ian's head, arm spans, legs, checked his ears, eyes, nose, teeth, heart, lungs, and even his testicles. (I'm not sure if any of you have been to an Endo but with little boys they have this string of beads and each bead is a different size. They take a testicle and hold the different size beads up to them to see which one matches the size. Of course there are certain sizes for certain ages. Luckily for Ian his man parts are growing the way they should.) Except for the height measurements everything else was just fine with Ian. After all of that Dr. Lazono took Ian out and measured himself just to be 100% sure that Ian hadn't grown any and he actually got a measurement that was 3 millimeters less than the nurse got. Of course this was just human error and the result was still the same.

The next step in this process is to have a stimulation test and an MRI done. Because of Ian's size he can only do the 4 hr test which would consit of them giving Ian some sort of medication to stimulate the growth hormones and then taking blood from him every 20 minutes for 4 hours. We have decided to wait another 3 months before taking this step for a few reasons. This test is very invasive for such a little guy and we would hate to put him through it if we don't have to. We are also hoping that Ian will gain a little more weight so all the blood that they will take wont be be as risky.

For me I am not very hopeful that Ian will grow between now and July but Dave seems to think Ian just needs a little more time and he will grow on his own. I guess we will have to wait to find out who is right on that one.