Just Breathing and Letting Daniel BE!

For those of you who are following our journey with doctor visits and Daniel's growth...I wanted to give you our latest, happy update.

We are finally breathing sighs of relief and we are finally just going to let Daniel BE!! We will still be monitoring him closely since he is still growing very slowly, but after our latest round of tests (recommended by the gastroenterologist last month) that actually ruled ideas OUT (hence the sighs of relief), we and our pediatrician are happy with just letting Daniel grow. We will still see our pediatrician at the end of this month for another mark on his growth chart and then we do go back to the endocrinologist in late summer for another growth hormone checkpoint. But other than that, the two theories bouncing around from all these doctors were officially ruled out as of last week and we are thrilled. At this point, we are pointing to genetics. We recently found my growth chart and it is eerily similar.

Daniel was unbelievably wonderful and patient and such a trouper for the tests he had done last week. We had lots of waiting to do, lots of new faces poking and prodding him, and he was just super for the almost 4 hours we were at the hospital. Snapped the pic above (doesn't it just melt your heart?!) while we were waiting for the first test to finish up. (That band on his arm was part of the test, actually he had a band on both arms at one point- he did great with keeping them on!) Daniel's lion sure was his best friend that day. That and a newly rediscovered car sounds book and some brand new blocks kept him well entertained while we sat and sat and sat. Daniel fell asleep before we were even out of the parking lot on the way home, slept a little more in his crib once we got home, woke up and played for a couple hours, and then went back to sleep for a couple more hours until dinner time. Needless to say, we treated him to some fun at the park after all that. (Plus we had to wear him out again for bedtime!)

I was so proud of Daniel that day- I actually had tears in my eyes, that's how proud I was. And then of course, when we got the results later that day and the next day, tears came again and I finally felt like I could breathe. (Because this whole time, there was always that little bug in the back of my mind that said maybe it's because of this- insert a million possible unspellable diagnoses here...and that made me hold my breath.) We are still w...a...i...t...i...n...g because as we all know, growing doesn't just happen overnight; but I no longer feel like we are waiting for test results, we're just waiting for Daniel- and I'll wait my whole life for him if I have to. I'll do whatever it takes. And for now, that's relaxing, enjoying every minute, and letting him BE.