Doubling Birthweight

[pinkspottywellies]

When should babies double their birthweight by? If she doesn't how bad is it? DD is 6 months (26 wks) on Friday and is still a fair way off.

Ds1 and ds2 were probably about 8mths old but were fairly big babies (9lbs+). Dd was just over a year old when she finally doubled her weight. The HV was a little concerned about dd but as long as they generally follow a centile line it's usually okay. (Dd was on the 75th centile at birth but is now on the 9th).

the 'average' is to double birthweight by 6 months and triple it by 1 year. My ds doubled his by around 13/14 weeks so was a bit ahead of himself!!

dd's gone from the 50th at birth to the 2nd. Getting her weighed again on Thursday when she'll be 6 months. Just wanted to know that it's not unheard of so that HV doesn't worry me when she starts spouting crap about formula

DD is on around 20th line, was born at 75th. She's just doubled her birth weight at 8 months.

ds2 has already doubled his birthweight aged 3 months, he was 8 13 and is now 18 pounds, ds1 was the same and is now a very tall skinny string bean! He is above the 98th p/tile or whatever it's called, but his growth curve is steady and HV said he's a big baby and keep on doing what we are doing. A friends baby is just one and weighs 20 pounds and is at the lower end of the p/til chart, both are happy and healthy and developing normally, just at different ends of the chart!

It's a bit of a myth - I read something that explained it quite well, saying that a tiny prem baby may well double their birthweight in well under six months, whereas a big baby who did the same would shoot off the centiles. If you look at the centile charts, you can actually see that a baby who started off on the 2nd centile and stayed there would double their birthweight by about 19 weeks.

That said, DD did double her birthweight at 27 weeks, so she pretty much did follow the 'rule', but she was born on the 75th centile and dropped to the 50th for the rest of her first year and a bit.

DD was 7lb12 when she was born, on the 50th centile and plodded along the curve. Then at about 10-16 weeks her 'curve' went almost flat and she went from 50th centile to 9th then carried on along the 9th for a while then at 24 wks I had her weighed and she'd dropped to the 2nd. I know they aren't meant to drop that much but all HV said was (at abt 14 wks) either top up with formula or 'just wean at 16 weeks' then last time (24 wks) that I need to start weaning now. Should I be worried or doing anything? She's doing really well other than this and is such a happy little thing!

DontCallMeBaby is right. DS has not yet quite doubled his birthweight at 11 months. But he weighed a tonne at birth (12lb 12) - thank goodness, I have enough problems lifting him as it is!

Agree with DontCallmeBaby - I was told/rad that babies are often born at the size the womb can handle rather than the size they are going to be, so a baby could be in a womb which does not have a hug capacity to grow, and this baby may well be pre-disposed to be a larger child, in which case he/she will grow bigger, and often within the first few months have doubled birth weight.
Also, babies might have grown to fit the bigger womb, and their growth slows a little once they are born until they fit their natural size (or at any point in their growing life - by brother was 5ft 6 at 15 yrs old. by 18 he was 6ft2. Not a family trait, I am 5ft 3!).

If your LO is behaving normally, seems happy and well, eating and drinking/going to toilet well, she is most likely fine.
(My DD is small, 5lb at birth, and now only 15lb at 10months, but perfectly healthy)

Thanks everyone. Going to have her weighed in the morning but won't be listening to the hv's advice which will probably be she's too small feed her donuts/chips/burgers/cake! (not a big fan of hv and her wean at 16 weeks advice)