Paci update - are we there yet?

I feel like the journey with Silas to be done with a pacifier is similar to a never-ending car ride.  You feel like you have been in it for days and it's really only been a few hours.  He was obviously not ready to be done with it and I was not ready for him to be done with the pacifier so this has been a lot more difficult of a transition for everyone involved than it was with Isabella. 

Isabella used her pacifier to go to sleep.  She soothed herself with it sometimes while she was awake but by the time she was biting holes in it she had found other ways to soothe herself.  She had several stuffed animals, babies and music makers that she was attached to by then and so her entire comfort didn't need to come from the pacifier.  Silas, on the other hand, has nothing.  He never warmed to a stuffed animal or anything other than the pacifier.  Yes, he loves those muslin blankets, but nothing compared to his dearest pink pacifier.  He used it for comfort, to go to sleep and to stay asleep. 

He has always been more of a 'biter' of things than Isabella ever was so I should have seen this coming that he would be biting holes in his pacifier earlier than she did but I was totally and completely caught off guard.  And yes, I understand that I was probably caught off guard more because he will be my last biological baby probably and I want him to stay a baby forever.  I'm going to leave that subject alone right now because if I think about it too much I will probably cry. 

Just to recap what has happened in the last few days in one sentence - life has been a challenge.  Once Corry cut the end off so Silas wouldn't choke if he bit off a bigger piece, Silas would no longer have anything to do with that pacifier.  We quickly realized that letting him see it was making him more and more upset as well.  I figured that he would take to it like Isabella had and just wear it on his finger but that didn't happen.  He acted like he didn't know what to do with it and kept having temper fits about it.  Durin one of his fits he took it outside, got mad and threw it down and so I left it in the garage.  It stayed out there for days until it got moved somewhere.  I need to track it down and save it like I did the one for Isabella. 

Needless to say, he is a lot more angry and has a lot shorter of a temper than he had when he was using the pacifier, but everyday seems to be getting better.  He is having fewer and fewer episodes when I would have previously let him have the pacifier so we are making progress.  Slowly but surely... Pray for us in the upcoming days as we are nearing the week mark and then I think that we will be over the worst of it. 

When did your kids stop using a pacifier? 

Silas's One Year Doctor Appointment

They should really tell you that after all the torture and awesome-ness of pregnancy, labor and delivery that you are up against another un-named number of years of pain in the form of "well-child check ups".  The first one is probably fine because your baby is too young to know any better.  After that first one though, they are wise to it and make it impossible to even go near the doctor's office without flipping out. 

From what I have come to understand, at least at my pediatrician's office, a well child check up consists of these things:

• height
• weight
• head circumference
• doctor's oral examination on you about food(s) your baby is consuming, activities your baby is doing (vocabulary, standing, walking, etc), and other items (how often they use the bathroom, etc)
• doctor's physical exam on the child
• vaccine(s), if you are getting any.  I will advise of my choices regarding vaccines but this is not going to be a vaccine debate and I will never have that debate because I believe that whatever choice a parent has made for their children regarding vaccines is right for their family. 

My daughter and son are those children that are fine in the waiting room and then the second that their names are called a few things start to change immediately.  You can tell instantly that their mood changes and they become anxious.  Isabella begins to try to find a way to escape.  I learned that she can not be trusted to walk around in the waiting room because then you can't wrangle her back in to go back into the back.  Once they get in the back they cry, whine, shake and almost hyperventilate until we get back into the stroller and are ready to leave.  The super crunchy part of me ridicules myself every time for putting my children through this, especially since most of the time we don't get a vaccine. 

Today was Silas's one year appointment.  I left Isabella with my mother because she doesn't understand that she is not the object of the torture for today.  Let me leave a side note right here that I don't perpetrate the stereotype for them that they are going to be tortured at the doctor.  I never joke with them that I am going to give them a shot; I never threaten them with the doctor, and have tried my best to prepare them for most of their appointments in the last six months by likening them to my daughter's favorite show Doc McStuffins.  She loves that show and she loves to talk about what they do at the doctor, but going there still means that you potentially might die while you are there. 

Silas started off the experience right by peeing through his diaper, through his clothes, down his legs and onto my lap while we were waiting in the waiting area.  This was 100% my fault for letting him have a bottle on the way there AND for noticing that he needed a diaper change when we got out of the car and not doing it then.  I love putting him in Fuzzi Bunz when we leave the house because they are a lot trimmer than our other cloth diapers and they fit him a lot better in the legs, however, they don't hold our biggest, thickest inserts and so they can leak if you don't notice the first time that they pee.  So, I had to go to the common area bathroom, change his diaper and change every stitch of clothes that he had on.  Awesome.  On top of that there was also a saucer sized wet spot on the front of my top thigh.  More awesome. 

We were called back while we were having a wardrobe change, so they saw us to the back as soon as I re-entered the waiting area.  And he has to completely disrobe again... for the second time in five minutes.  He was as excited about this as I was about it doing it.  He weighed 23.2 lbs which is 50th percentile for weight and was 30 inches tall which was 60th percentile for height.  Now for the amazing part: 19.5cm for head circumference.  My son is well known for his enormous head.  >95% for head circumference.  I guess you have to be the best at something!  Now he doesn't have like a freakishly cartoonish looking big head.  You would just look at him like a stranger and think "damn that kid has a big head." 

Everything else looks awesome.  He is ahead in speech, ahead to average in capabilities like walking, grabbing for items, etc.  We didn't get a vaccine this time because he has been sick recently.  We had a few conversations about what he is doing, like super sleeping > 15 hours per day, eating everything in the house, and using the cloth diapers because of his potential latex allergy.  He then went through the normal torture activities like looking in his nose, in his eyes, looking in his diaper (not sure what they are looking for), and making sure that his overall body and muscle tone looks good.

Come back at 18 months.  Appointment time: 9:45 back in the car 10:15.