9 month baby weighs 2stone - should I worry?

[somewherebecomingrain]

Hi my little girl is very heavy - two stone, maybe a bit more now, and she is only 9 and a half months.

Everyone who picks her up goes 'oof'. She weighs more than many 2 year olds. I carry her around in a toddler sling.

She is tall - growing out of her 12-18m clothes and wearing mainly 18-24 month clothes. So she is in proportion to some extent.

I just feel she has very heavy bones - I can't even believe her size accounts for how heavy she is.

My main concerns are:
Getting stuck in a vicious circle where she cant move cause she is too heavy, and because she doesn't move, she keeps getting heavier, and therefore can't move.... Etc
hurting herself when she is learning to be mobile
Finding physical activity difficult throughout her life and having weight problems,

my mil I think has the same body and has always been overweight although 5:2 has sorted her out aged 76 a miracle.

my 9 month old is massive - 91st for weight but multiple cms above the top of the centile chart for length. husband and I are both >99th centile for height.

He is 10kg and 80cm
4y/o daughter is also hugely tall and is only 13.5kg
so I do think that 2 stones (c13kg) sounds a very great deal indeed.

I'm not offended at all nor do I feel got at. I was a bit at the morbidly obese comment that is the only one but I'm just saying I expected it - that's the deal with these threads.

Sorry. I am really grateful for the advice - I did want opinions and I've got some fantastic ones, there is no doubt that mn is a massive resource for situations like this., I feel much more on top of it, the range of opinion is great and it wouldn't be as powerful or interesting if people didn't give frank opinions.

X

hels I agree - she isn't a 'normally heavy' baby iyswim. She's really extreme.

But not morbidly obese

Morbidly obese is a term appropriate to use in a medical context by HCPs treating adults. It's a term that isn't necessarily helpful in laypersons conversation and certainly not when applied to a baby none of you have seen.....

When looking at weight the reliability of the scales is the something to consider. Op - I think you need to get your HV to weigh dd at clinic over a few months so you can both see the trend. It may be that you need to do some things differently. It may be that you will find her weight evens out. You are clearly motivated and interested to take the best care you can of her. I think you've had a rough ride on this thread tbh. Too many posters are too snappy at opining without thinking - do they a) know what they think they know and b) have they considered the impact of what they are posting. Unfortunately the answer to both questions is all too often no.....

"Morbidly obese is a term appropriate to use in a medical context by HCPs treating adults. It's a term that isn't necessarily helpful in laypersons conversation and certainly not when applied to a baby none of you have seen....."

You don't have to have seen a 30 stone man to know that he is morbidly obese. The term "morbidly obese" is a hell of a lot polite than other terms used to describe fat people.

If you look at this chart then you realise that the OP child has a problem. A child whose weight is substantially above the 99.6 centile is so far from the norm it has to be investiaged even if the child is in proportion. My nearly five year old is only slightly heavier at 2 st 6lb.

www.rcpch.ac.uk/system/files/protected/page/A5%20Girls%20UKWHO.pdf

I think that this baby needs a consultant paediatrian rather than a health visitor to find out what is wrong. I think that going to the health visitor is a waste of time.

" a) know what they think they know and b) have they considered the impact of what they are posting. Unfortunately the answer to both questions is all too often no....."

No harm will come to the OP baby if take her baby to see the doctor. A real life doctor can see the baby and decide if there is a problem.

Charts are meaningless without verification of the measurements you're plotting on them. The OP has a well and happy child. It would be nice if posters could stop trying to convince her otherwise.

OP I do feel for you. There are clearly a lot of people with slim kids here to whom your DD's statistics are completely alien and shocking.

And by and large it's no bad thing that you will speak to your GP/HV about her, but absolute statements like "It WILL affect her health in adulthood and will already be restricting her physical development as she is not able to move around in the normal way" are scaremongering with Daily Mail subtlety.

My DS1 - who was almost 2 stone at 6 months - crawled at 8 months, walked at 11 months, ran at 12 months, and at 4 plays football, scoots, cycles, swims without armbands. He is constantly active and extremely strong.

I know 2 other children like him (one boy, one girl) who were like him as babies and they've both evened out, with activity.

By all means have her checked out but it does happen that perfectly healthy babies are sometimes very large. It's ridiculous to suggest that it is a foregone conclusion that she will be affected into adulthood.

My DS was just the same as MrsNoodleHeadss DC. 25lb at 6 month.(he also walked at 11months] I got comments wherever I went. I can't remember how big he was at other times but he was very big, both in height and wieght.
He was big because he had too many calories not because of 'big bones' or 'being dense' I actively cut down his calories. I gave him water with his meals and gave him smaller portions of food. I also stopped feeding him during the night. He wasn't on a diet but I was careful not to over feed him IYSWIM.
You CAN over feed a baby, I know because I think I did it with my first DS . He was a happy content baby and he slept well but I think being so big probably meant he couldn't move as easily as other babies.
He is 23 now, 6'3 broad shouldered but very slim and handsome
None of my other DC were skinny as babies but I was careful not to over feed them. They have all grown up tall and very slim.

Hi OP!
My dd was 28lb 7 at 9 months (just dug her red book out) and 79cm. She was also 99% ebf at that point so I'm pretty sure I wasn't over feeding her - we did blw and she was very slow to start with several allergies, so a typical day would be 2 bites of pear and one piece of pasta!
I did worry a bit at the time as it's miles off the top of the graph, and had a few people tell me to wean her but I'm glad now that I let her go at her own pace.
Got a GP to check her at 1 (and 32lb) and he was quite happy with her, and we saw a dietician because of her allergies who was happy with her diet.
She was 35lb at 18 months and is 36lb a year later (and finally eats well, it was slow going though!), so she has stopped piling weight on but still stretching upwards. I think this is just how she was built!

People with huge babies (mine were) are saying it is worth going to the GP because the OP's girl is not that tall (91%) and hugely over the top the curves for weight, so not quite in proportion.

Even if ours were in proportion, they still got checked just because they were above the 99.9% curves, as any babies under the 0.4 % curve would be too.

My DC was checked out by a paediatrician because he was so big and was found to be ok. I am curious if anyone else thinks you can over feed a breast fed baby. ??i really think you can and I did

I wasn't force feeding my DC and i certainly wasn't giving him crap to eat but I think he was glugging down too much milk on top of his food. I didn't give him lots of feeds but, I think, he drank a lot when he did.
I cut down his feeds, never let him graze and made sure I fed him healthily. Gradually grew into his body.

It's all about calories isn't it???

Tootles I think dd1 was overfed as a breastfed baby. At that time it was all about putting weight on, and I remember saying to the HV (after 3 weeks of putting on over 1lb a week, and the centile lines were flattening out, and her weight was still shooting upwards) "at what point do you worry they're too big?"
And the HV said "with a bf baby you never need to worry that."
Which is obviously stupid, there must come a time when you worry.

When I started her on solids she ate huge amounts (think whole banana at 4 months-that's an arm full of banana) and continued bf as much as she had before.

Now I didn't think it was a worry because she was tall. But what I found out subsequently (from research), is that if a baby (or child) is overfed, they also tend to grow early. With a malnourished child they grow less and they don't reach their height potential, but with an overfed child they reach their height potential early-but won't exceed it.
So what you have is a child who grows early, so looks in proportion, but then reaches a point where they don't grow as much (not necessarily at the end of their growth, it can be a point where they stop for a time) and if they continue eating so much, they then grow widthways.

For some reason when I'm bfing then I produce gold top. But dd1 liked to feed for long periods and being the pfb I let her sometimes spend most of the day feeding, which looking back wasn't good for her. (but very nice and cuddly!)

I don't know Tootles. DS was at his biggest (in terms of centiles) when being exclusively breast fed, before we introduced solids. I fed on demand, and at reasonably spaced intervals. It was like being attached to a hoover, and he'd drain me within 5 minutes.

The HV told me to carry on doing what I was doing, and that I shouldn't reduce feeds.

It was when I started feeding him solids, and he started moving around, that his weight gain really tapered off.

I do think some young children are pre-programmed to have patterns of weight gain that parents have little control over.

Gosh, DS2 was probably similar. He's now almost 5 and is wearing 7yo clothes but is average to slim in terms of physique. He's still pretty 'dense' though and weighs more than you would expect, but then he's also freakishly strong, so is clearly naturally muscular.

I think the weight alone would be worrying, but as she's tall I don't think you have anything to be concerned about. It sounds like she's more or less in proportion.

Just got the dr book for my eldest out
He wasn't weighed regularly so the closest I have is at 49/52 weeks so 11 months when he weighed just under two stone
He seemed normal to me at the time. Was heavy born and is still stocky
He was 16kg at 2.2 so slowed right down
Compare her centimes and see what you get

Hi, my ds2 is a heavy baby, he's 15 months and was weighed at 2 stone this morning.

He was tubby when he was born and had continued that way. He has a milk allergy which may have contributed, due to him needing x amount of milk on top of his food for his calcium intake (rather than reducing milk inline with food increasing) and more use of fruit purée as a dessert.

Anyway...due to his allergies he's under a dietician at the hospital who we see every 3/6 months and were there today. It is a brill service and all the dieticians I have seen have been great.

They ask about his average intake of food in a day, talks through the balance of reducing milk and increasing food, making sure all food groups are included, fluid intake, portion sizes, snacks, give out recipe sheets/books. They really have been fab.

I think you should speak to a health visitor/gp as others have said and get some reassurance and maybe ask if you can see a dietician? Or get some proper advice on the subject? When my eldest was first diagnosed with allergies I was chasing health visitors all over desperate for decent advice but none was forthcoming...

Natasha OP is also feeding formula and weaning so that rule won't apply - her body thinks baby is feeding less so the milk will be MORE calorific rather than less.

This baby is way over the centiles of even the tallest height to weight ratio.

Something needs to change, I think OP has stopped adding butter and cheese to the baby food...

After a worrying bout of illness, I weighed my dd and her two friends today. All aged almost 4 years old, all weighed 2.2 stone.
2 stone at 9 months? Yes I would be concerned.

Concerned?
Ds1 was well over a stone at 11 weeks.
I can't be bothered to look up his 9mo weight, but I'm pretty sure it was similar, if not more.
His paediatrician was delighted, as it meant that he was better able to weather the double pneumonia he was fighting, as he had a bit of extra back-up energy. she did call him fatso, but she was thrilled she didn't have to worry about him losing weight whilst he fought the infection as a newborn(ish).
Yes, he was breast fed. At 9 mos he had glorious rolls of flab hanging over his knees. At 12 he's a skinny runty beanpole.
My friends used to pick him up and do that enforced grunt thing, and mutter about him being made out of lead.

No worries Natasha :)

Over feeding can cause a baby to shoot up in height as well as weight. So the fact a baby is tall as well as heavy doesn't necessarily they're in proportion and all is hunky dory - they are still overfed iyswim.

I also think "you can overfeed a bf baby" is a bit of a myth.

So, I think the OP's DD has been overfed (I must say it'd never occur to me to add butter and cheese to a pouch UNLESS my child was skinny and needed fattening up) but that in itself isn't uncommon. I would seek out a paed referral just for reassurance though.

*i think "you CAN'T overfeed a bf baby" is a myth.