Do your best, now do better!

I try to do well by my kids. I think about the best way to do things, I get angry with myself when I don't think before I do things, I feel guilty when they have a rogue cookie or when they have to have juice because all the other kids are even though I did my best to not even let her KNOW what juice was for close to three years. And then some bad news.

I took Ellis to his one year doctor appointment. He seemed healthy to me and felt like it would be a regular appointment. We would be out of there with the usual painful waiting which that I even thought I would avoid since I made an early appointment so I could leave Clara with Matt.

The first thing they do when you get there is they weigh and measure them. Right away, a problem. Ellis only weighed 17 lbs and 7 ounces, not even on the chart for a 12 month old. So all the food worries that I had with him, the worries that I actually succesfully talked myself out of were actually validated. He was not eating enough. He is SUCH a hard baby to feed. Most meals end in tears and frustration on both our parts. Clara was such a good eater compared to him and I am such a strong believer in giving them a myriad of GOOD foods. I just don't want a kid that will only eat two things that are BAD for them. Ellis really wants to be that child. New things don't fly. Something he likes the day before he is angry at the next. It is a constant battle and I never know if he is getting enough food. The doctor said it is nothing too bad to worry about, that most nursing babies drop in weight a little after the ninth month, and actually Clara did. But then the blood tests came back and he was severely anemic. I need to find out what the number was. They are sending his blood in for a number of tests and I am anxious to hear what the results are. I am trying not to be nervous about it, I am trying not to be scared by it, because we do not know what is wrong, if anything and it might be minor and fixable. One thought that came up was that it was thalassemia, which Nate has. I hope it is minor and then again, it is nothing to worry about. I hugged that baby so hard all day. I followed him around and stuffed him so full of food he pooped three times. I just look at him and nothing seems wrong. He is so happy, so full of life that I can't even imagine that there is anything wrong with him. But I have to remember, even if there is, he is still the SAME little boy that fills my heart with joy and love as he was the second before we found out any of this. I just have to stuff him full of iron-clad foods, fatty foods to beef him up and love him even that much more...