Weight and height moving down centile lines

[Lois]

Hi everyone

Does anyone else have experience of this? My 10 month old was born above the 50th height centile then at 3 month he moved across and stayed parallel to the 25th centile but now he is below the 9th. His weight was above the 50th until 6 months and since then has been on the 25th. His potential height centile range is between the 91st and 9th.

Am I being paranoid? In every other way is development is textbook and part of me is thinking that babies don't all grow at standard rates and he'll catch up later, but part of me is worried.

I'm still breastfeeding but he doesn't have any meat and very little dairy. He does have a wide range of fruit and veg, beans and pulses. I haven't been too worried about protein until now and was thinking that maybe after one year I would start giving eggs and fish.

I'd love to know what everyone thinks.

[Mog]

Ifds has started walking or crawling recently, a doctor told me they expect the percentiles to go down as they are more active. My dd also went down slightlybut the HV wasn't concerned as I am quite small and slight, so are you or your husband of small build?

[mears]

If your baby is active, happy and healthy looking forget the charts. All children have fluctuations. Unless height and weight is measured accurately ( highly unlikely with babies) by the same devices and people there are margins for error. Relax and enjoy your baby.

[Cha]

I agree with everyone - don't worry! Also, the weight charts that HV's use are from the US and out of date ie taken from a population of mainly bottle fed babies. Breastfed babies are always lighter and there was an article in the newspaper a few months ago about updating these charts in line with the trend for more mothers to breast feed and for longer. I worried exactly like you are about my dd - especially as she never ate anything til about 7 months - but now she's got a fine old appetite on her, although she'll never be a bruiser. I have also fed her fish and eggs from about 7 /8 months with no ill effects!

[SofiaAmes]

Don't worry! It's not an exam that's going to determine the rest of their life. My ds was all over the chart. I really wasn't worried, especially after I realized that at least one of the hv's wasn't actually marking things in the correct place on the graph and another couldn't figure out how to convert kg's to lb's. Weight and height are only part indicators of nutritional intake. Don't forget that a large portion of the obese in the usa and uk are technically malnourished if you use the standards used to measure the 3rd world.

[Joe1]

I hate those charts. I had so much trouble with ds for the first few months I will be less likely to go the regular weigh ins with no2. When you think they are now advising to breastfeed to help reduce children being obese I think it is past time that they should be updated.

My ds was always happy, full of energy and I never had a worry, so follow your instincts, not the charts, you will soon know if anything is wrong.

[titchy]

Lois

I agree with what everyone has said about the weight centile - they do drop/ rise to their normal weight centile irrespective of what centile they were born on. As long as there isn't a huge difference between the height and weight centiles e.g. a 91st centile for height baby being less than the 9th centile for weight - this would probably be a baby that needed feeding up a bit. It looks like your ds's weight is fine for his build so carry on the good work!

His height is slightly different though. Occasionally children can lack growth hormone, and typically in children that do their height starts off at a particular centile, then at around 4 months, when their own growth hormone should kick in, their height drops down the centiles. It's quite unusual and is more than likely that your son is simply due for a growth spurt, but as growth hormone can be given artificially and is best given before a child is three or four, it might be worth seeing if your hv or gp can refer your son. In all likelihood there is nothing to worry about, but waiting lists for a consultant can be long so might be worth acting now.

HTH.

[GillW]

My beanpole DS also slipped from 91st to below 25th, and we also got a lot of grief from the HV's. I do try not to worry about it as he eats plenty, but is simply so active that he's burning it all off (he was crawling well be 7 months and has hardly sat still since!). In a few years time we'll be laughing when the focus is on overweight, under-active children..... and I just wonder how much of those will have been the focus of the "s/he ought to weigh more" scaremongering now?

Those charts are only averages anyway - it shouldn't mean that they have to be stuck to exactly - for every child who slips down the charts there will be another who is going up to balance out the trends. If the mother of every child who was below average was forced into "feeding them up" to get them "up to average" as were told to do all that would happen is that the next time the charts were compiled the average would have moved up - and so the cycle goes on making things even tougher for the next generation of mothers.

[honeybunny]

Yes, my ds1 slipped from 50th at birth to below the 9th by 6months, weightwise, and 90th to50th in height. He hardly put on any weight between 5 and 7months, no-one at my gps was bothered by it, yet it caused me hours of anguish. They talked about "oh, I expect he's started moving around more and burning off those calories" only he wasn't crawling at that stage, and just sat all the time. Not highly active at all. Bloody health profs at my surgery were incapable of listening, and useless with advise. Thank god I moved! ds2 was regularly monitored while the hv was doing home visits post birth, but I havent been since (ds2 now 19weeks). He's happy, healthy and I couldn't be more relaxed! He must be growing well as he's in 6-12mo clothes already! But that's my only indication. He's fully bf and we've just started weaning. He loves his baby rice, unlike ds1, and I'm sure its because I'm so chilled about the whole thing. Just wish I could have been more like this with ds1.

So Lois, my advise too, is throw the red book in a cupboard, and forget about it and rely on the feed back your baby gives you. And please stop worrying!

[Lois]

Thank you all for the reassuring messages

Mog - Yes he is very mobile and yes I am only short so maybe ds will be more like me than dh.

Mears - Thank you for the message. Yes he is a happy little man.

KS, Cha, Joe1, SofisAmes and GillW- Thank you for telling me about your similar experience. It is so good to know that it is not just me.

Cha - I had a look for the charts you mentioned. They seem to show b/f babies picking up at around one year. Here's the address for anyone who's interested.
www.promom.org/bf_info/growth.html

Titchy - Thank you for the information about the growth hormone. I didn't know that. I'll get ds measured again in a month or two and ask them to refer me if he has dropped off the bottom of the chart.

But until then I'm going to put the book away and enjoy playing hide and seek with the cheeky bambino.