3yr. checkup

Owen had his 3 yr. checkup at 8am this morning. Wow am I glad that I took Reuel up on the offer to stay home with Asher. I thought it could work, but it would have been impossible!! Asher is way too wiggly and Owen needed some mommy-support to get through the appointment.

I prepped him quite a bit in advance. We headed into the office with his arms full of stuffed pig from grandpa and his bag of toy doctor tools. I told him that he could listen to Dr. Hoder's heart with his stethoscope, and that seemed to perk him up about the whole affair. The promise of a chocolate donut (with sprinkles of course) if he behaved well had also been spoken, which didn't hurt.

He performed and followed directions just perfectly, and then Mrs. Marie the medical assistant (who Owen loves) told us that there would be no shots! Yippee! Owen was very happy to hear that, as he was aware this could be part of the morning.
He is just over 3 feet, maybe 37 inches (~35%ile), 30.5lbs (25%ile), and ~15.5BMI (25%ile). Relatively, he lost a lot of weight vs. last year, but has kept his length growing the same. Hence, the currently wiry boy who can hardly hold size 3 pants on his waist.

After today, Owen is officially never going to trust me or a doctor again! At the last 2 appointments we've all gone to for Asher, Owen has had to get a shot too, since the flu shots he was overdue on became available. Today, he was told there were no shots, and then, OOPS!! Dr. Hoder decided he needed 2. And his last round of routine bloodwork. Owen was NOT happy, but really he didn't completely freak out like I thought he would and he did OK. I warned him about the shots, and then we got those done. I did not warn him about the bloodwork :} He figured out what was going on as soon as the nurse said, 'Honey, we are going to get some of your muscle juice and send it to Superman to see how strong you are!' Yeah, right. 3 year olds are seriously not that fool-able. But to the nurses' credit, they did their job so quickly he hardly had time to panic, he mostly just looked like a deer in headlights as he watched his blood poured into a vial...I think that kind of creeped him out. He absolutely will not let me take off the gauze and tape on his arm now.

So, we headed over to the donut shop 2 doors down from the doctor's office (on the far side of the Chuck E. Cheese between them...so mean to put a kiddie casino next to a pediatrician's office!!). I paged through the handouts they gave me as we walked. And I quote, "Ideally, by this age she no longer uses eating--or not eating--to demonstrate defiance, nor does she confuse food with love or affection." Oops, probably donut rewards don't help with that one!! So Owen passed with flying colors, but I still have a few things to fix.