We took Sprogzilla to be weighed today. I didn’t realise, but it has been a whopping 7 months since we last visited baby clinic. Mostly it’s because I don’t drive so rely on Sprogdaddy to take us and he happens to be working whenever there’s a session.

Today was one of Sprogdaddy’s rare Thursdays off, so we shot off after Sprogzilla’s morning nap just in time before they finished up. It was nice to get out and about for a bit and the boy enjoyed mucking about on the large playroom floor. There were a few babies and toddlers there, but we were seen quite quickly and thankfully Sprogzilla is more compliant in sitting on the scales these days.

I was rather surprised to find he is only 9kg and thus still not even 20lbs. I didn’t think too much of it until we arrived home and I checked the charts in the red book. He had fallen from midway between the 25th and 9th percentile to bang on the 9th. I did some googling and was relieved to find this not particularly worrying, however one doctor did suggest not offering the breast before solids anymore in case Sprogzilla is getting full up on fluids first.

As Sprogzilla is a bit of a short fellow, I decided to check his height as well. We had to do this several times as the little monkey doesn’t like to keep still, but it worked out around 72cms. I then checked the height chart and this is when I started to worry – he had only gained 5cms in seven months, his height was now off the bottom of the scale!

Thus followed a call to the health visitor. Our usual HV was not available, so Sprogdaddy spoke to another who offered to come out on Monday and give him a full height/weight check which would then be followed up a few weeks later to see what progress (if any) had been made. I tried to put it to the back of my mind.

A couple of hours later, we received a call from our own HV – she was just finishing up at the local surgery and wanted to know if she could pop over in 15 minutes and do the checks herself. What a relief, we could see somebody about it today.

Now I must say we are lucky enough to have a wonderful HV, she clearly loves kids and will happily spend time answering questions. As it turns out, she had a child with growth hormone deficiency (GHD) so was very understanding of our concerns about his height. She brought with her a more accurate height scale, though it seems our own efforts were pretty good as she also measured him at 72cms.

Most likely there is nothing wrong and Sprogzilla is just settling into his true height percentile, but we are to have him checked in another three and six months. If his height goes further off the scale, we will be referred for tests. The good news is that if he does have GHD, it is easily treatable and won’t cause him any long-term harm if treatment is started before his mid-teens. Well, I guess if you can call having hormones made using recombinant DNA injected daily into your subcutaneous tissue “easily treatable”….

Being the worry-wort mother that I am, I will now proceed to look up every horror story about GHD I can find. Someone stop me before I drive myself crazy lol…..

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