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Nine Months

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 Andrew is now nine months old and busy as ever. When people ask about the differences between Nathan and Andrew, I usually joke that Andrew will be the one to give me gray hairs! He is on the go every waking minute. No joke! But I know that he will also bring a sense of adventure to our family. 

After a month spent pulling himself across the floor on his belly, he mastered the art of efficient crawling just days before turning nine months. We now have make-shift barricades in the house to prevent him from entering or exiting specific areas.

Likewise, Andrew loves to pull himself up on his feet using any drawer, table, or body that he can. He will let go for just a moment, raising his arms triumphantly at standing independently before falling back to the ground on his diaper covered bottom. 


We visited Dr. Chrissie for his nine month check up at which we discovered he had not fully recovered from a recent ear infection and he had lost a pound of weight in just two months. Both were cause for the doctor's concern and we left with a prescription for antibiotics and orders to feed more milk to Andrew. Neither task was as easy as it sounded. The antibiotics for the ear infection were a supped-up version of the delicious pink Amoxicillin that tasted tangy with a chalky texture. Andrew did his best to prevent us from getting it into his mouth requiring a variety of strategies. Finally, at about day 7 of 10, I found a way that was peaceful and did not result in tears for either of us. As for getting him to drink more milk, that was also a challenge. The first attempt lasted an hour and he consumed 5 of the 6 ounces recommended by Dr. Chrissie. We were actually sitting at a rest area for that hour, heading north for the holiday weekend. Since then, he has acquiesced considerably and will take four bottles a day.  




As for Andrew's nine month statistics, he weighed 21 pounds 12 ounces, dropping from the 95th percentile in May to the 75th. He is 28 inches long, just half an inch shorter than Nathan was at this age (Andrew was also born half an inch shorter).



Update: Andrew's follow up appointment with Dr. Chrissie showed his ear infections have not cleared the way she hoped. We have an appointment scheduled with a Pediatric ENT specialist next week for consultation. She said she would rather have the expert take a look than prescribing more antibiotics in hopes of progress made. Dr. Chrissie wants to make sure we resolve this problem prior to any delays in speech development. The good news from yesterday's follow up was he had gained just over half a pound in the two weeks we've pushed more milk. He weighed 22 pounds 6 ounces, which is definitely heading in the right direction.

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