The Stout One

Bo has been sick with a really random rash.  At first, it looked like Chicken Pox.  The poor little guy was a week away from receiving his vaccine and suddenly he's covered in spots.  And since Jack just had his booster precisely two weeks prior to his first symptoms, it looked like chicken pox was the easy answer.  However, a week passed and the rash no longer looked like pox.  The doctor diagnosed him with Coxsackie virus, although it didn't really present itself that way either.  He's still rashy, he's still itchy.  We are past the two week mark now and there is no sign of the rash disappearing.  His cough, fever, and runny nose are going away though, so hopefully the rash will follow.  I don't think we will ever know what exactly it was, but one thing is for certain.  Nobody else contracted it.  Thank heavens for that.  I've been keeping him away from other kids just in case, but since nobody in the house got it, I'm not overly concerned about it's contagiousness anymore.  Neither is the doctor, she told me I didn't need to keep him away from anybody at this point.  If it was Coxsackie, one of the other kids would have gotten it by now.  And considering Bo's favorite game is "Let me see how quick I can stick my spitty finger in your mouth without you noticing", I'd say it's not contagious.  

Anyway, The Rash was not the real reason of this post.  The real reason for this post was the fact that he's been to the doctor a few times in the past few weeks and something has stuck out in my head more than the rash.

The Growth Chart.  

Ah, the dreaded growth chart.  If you've ever been on the edge of an underweight child, you know all about the dreaded growth chart.  They weigh your child, they measure your child, and you wait… you know it's coming.  The doctor sits there with the little graph and plots the circles, and you patiently wait for him to tell you that your kid is in the 25% (or 5% in Justice's case when he was a baby), and then the conversation of nutrition comes up.  I always get really pissed at the nutrition conversation.  I feed my kids really well.  So, yeah, my kids are skinny.  They get to eat crap every once in awhile, and I do like to bake a few times a month.  However, for the most part, I don't need "the talk" about not giving them junk food and making their calories "count".   They are skinny because they eat right.  That's sort of the way it works.  

I'm sitting there prepping myself for the skinny kid report, and guess what happens?  Nothing.  I was thankful to dodge that bullet, but was still curious.  So when I got home I plotted it out myself.  

Turns out Bo is not in the 5th% or even 25th% for his weight.  He just happens to be in the 95th% percentile for his weight!  Ha!  Little fatty!  I sure didn't see that coming.  And guess what else?  His height is only in the 25th%.  So not only is he fat, but he's short to boot.  Jack is also short, so that's really no surprise to us.

I couldn't see it though.  I have been shaking my head over it and thinking maybe the measurements are wrong so I took them myself at home.  Nope, not wrong.  He's short and fat.  But he doesn't look short and fat to me.  And then I took this picture last night.  And maybe, just maybe I can admit that that's a pretty tasty looking leg right there.  And his gut is pretty awesome too now that I think about it.  My Dad says he has "Mickey Mouse" hands, so I guess those might be on the fat side, too.  

The Stout One.  Like a little fire hydrant.  Ha!