For Anyone Concerned About Percentiles

[shellbell3]

I'm not worried about where Ash is along the chart just as long as it didn't drop dramatically. Ash is pretty much in 25% for weight and has been roughly all along but if she suddenly dropped to like 5% then I may be concerned about the chart.

[Visitor7]

My mum was telling me a story a few weeks ago about when she had my sister.
My sister was a small baby, small child and is small as an adult.
When she was growing up, the dr's would insist that my mum wasn't feeding her enough because she was so small. When she was 11 months old, they put her in hospital insisting she was under nourished, and the whole week she was in hospital, she didn't gain weight. She simply was just a small baby. She wasn't sick or anything, just small. They eventually agreed that my mum was taking good care of her and was sent home with mum.

I've never worried too much about the charts either. In fact my dr hates them. When it's time for Nina to have a check-up or immunistation, he'll weigh her, check her out etc, but he won't compare it to the charts. He's a dr, who's had 2 children, he knows if she is well or not. So do I.
Mothers instinct is best, I think.

[Ezz]

I think the charts are unhelpful the other way too - when your bubba is big. DS is 8.2kg at 13 weeks (so he doesn't even fit on the charts - he is beyond the 97th percentile). I'm breastfeeding him (and only as he demands - usually 3-4 hours) - but everyone keeps telling me how BIG he is.

Liz - I didn't realise that breastfed bubbas put on weight more quickly either! (on the WHO chart he *almost* fits on the 97th percentile )

[visitor1]

Ill admit im one of them mums thats is constantly worried about these damn charts, more so with Jasmine then Chelsea, as Jas is always off the charts for everything. I dont mind her head and length, but weight is an issue for me.

Jodi when you said:

When she was growing up, the dr's would insist that my mum wasn't feeding her enough because she was so small

It bought back memories for me. When Chelsea had her 6 month check-up with the MCHN, she hadn?t gained much weight in the 8 weeks since the last weigh in. I told the nurse that we hadn?t started on solids as yet but Chelsea was drinking 220ml bottles 4 time a day and her sleeping was an issue. The nurse turned around and told me I must be doing it all wrong and she said, You must be starving her, oh Chelsea, is mummy starving you?? I cried all the way home believing I had been starving her.

[Rouge]

Yep I don't worry about the charts. With Paris we saw Paed's and everything because she was "underweight" as the Paed said to me the chart doesn't mean anything providing they are following their own pattern. Graph's are more important than numbers compared with other numbers With Seth the MCHN started to get a bit funny as Seth was following a similar pattern to his sister. So I stopped going. I wasn't going to be made to feel bad especially when I was breastfeeding the second time round and I didn't want ANYONE meddling with that. Funnily thought two babies fed differently both followed the exact same pattern. So I guess that blows the theory of swapping to formula to get babies to be "healthier" (ie. gain more weight).

[Trillian]

Liz, I'm glad I'm not the only one who was confused buy the differences in the charts, I noticed it too that the WHO charts were higher. I plot A's weight on both charts whenever we got to the MCHN, which is rare anyway, and he has this gorgeous curve on them - no way is he a world beater in the weight department, but he's just consistent and happy to do his own thing.

[Liz]

I agree - it's the graph not the numbers.. Nice smooth curve is what we want