The Ups and Downs of a 4 Month Old Ryker

Our little guy hit 4 months on the 27th of March, but just had his 4 month check-up yesterday (April 4th). We have had a lot of changes with him in the last month, the hardest being the growth spurt that hit almost at the same time as the 4 month mark! It was insane to keep up with, I was literally feeding him every hour! Not an hour in between feedings, but eating at 3:30, then again at 4:30... so basically only about a half an hour in between, which made it impossible to get anything done needless to say. He was even, for the first time since he was about a month old, waking up for a 3 or 4 am feeding when he usually slept through the night at least 8-10 hours! That was rough! Thankfully the hardest only lasted a few days, and he is now back to eating at better intervals, though he is eating quite a bit more! And he is also back to sleeping through the night, so I guess we can't complain too much! I thought he must be growing like crazy, and he seemed to be as well... but I guess he wasn't so much, but I'll get to that in a bit. 

Milestones

-Rolling over- He is no longer just flukely rolling over when he's mad (our little hulk!), but consistently rolls over anytime you put him on his belly these days. And within the last week or two, has really been better at rolling from his back to his tummy... and I'm sure in no time he'll be all over the place! 

-Head Control- is pretty near perfect, and he is starting to move around a bit on his belly when up on his arms. 

-Laughing- doesn't seem so random anymore, and it is getting a little harder to get a chuckle out of him... though he still does laugh, he just understands a little more what it means and makes us work for it ;) 

-He is now playing Peek-a-boo!! I honestly thought it was just a random thing that he didn't know what he was doing at first... but now I'm certain he knows what he's doing and it is SOoo cute!! 

-He is also starting to hold his bottle, which is very funny since we use Tommy Tippees and they are quite big, so though he thinks he's holding it, I'm sure it will be awhile before he can truly hold it! 

-Feeding I felt was going great! He has finally gotten to the point where he is breast feeding more in the day than bottle feeding. He is between 4 1/2 to 5 ounces from the bottle and I'm sure he can get up to 6 from breast feeding since I produce more than that in a feeding. 

Stats

His doctor's appointment yesterday was a little disheartening :( His weight was 12 lbs 2 oz, which puts him below the 2nd percentile, so I'm just saying the 1st percentile, which needless to say was a bit sad for me to hear, considering all that we went through with Em at this age as she continually dropped off the charts. His Dr did make me feel better saying he wasn't concerned it was a growth issue, but rather can be attributed to his still problematic reflux. We started prevacid the very same day, though that has been another issue in and of itself! We got a script for it and I went to the pharmacy to get it only to find out that the generic solutabs have completely been pulled off the shelves, they were really hard to find when Em was little and pharmacies were always in short supply. We ended up having to get the name brand for her a few times and it was $60 a month! Well, the name brand is now $100 a month.... which is just INSANE!! About a year and a half ago, I started buying it for Em over the counter, which was much more cost efficient even before they had generic over the counter. But now that you can get it in generic form over the counter, it ends up being even cheaper than the generic prescription, especially if you get it at Costco. It's easy for Em because I just open up the capsules and dump the contents into a syringe that then goes in her g-tube.... Ryker however needs half a dose, and the contents inside the capsules are a lot of tiny little static balls... that are impossible to count or try and separate... but I did my best and I guess it turned out ok, it just took about a half an hour, but lucky I will only have to do that part every other day! Now the even sadder part is it cannot go in breast milk or anything else appealing. It has to be dissolved in water and poor little Ryker has to take it by mouth :( It is sad, so we're really hoping it helps! But thankfully, it already seems to be... the kid has not thrown up even once today! Which is absolutely unheard of for him! So if in two weeks (when we go back to the dr for another weight check) he still hasn't gained enough weight, then we might have to look at adding some cereal to some of his bottle to help thicken it. Or even starting some mild solids, which I really don't want to do yet. So I guess I will update again in a couple weeks on that issue.

His length is 25 1/2 inches which put him in the 63rd percentile... yup, still a string bean! But that was also a bit of a concern since he was steadily above the 90th percentile for length before, but maybe he's just trying to even out ;)

His head is now 16 inches, which is still in about the 21st percentile.

He is completely out of newborn size for everything! Including diapers. He has successfully been in size 1 diapers for a couple of weeks now, and it is SOooo nice to be out of that in between stage (when he had too much waste for the newborns, but the 1's were still baggy on him and he leaked out of every available gap!), we do have to get them as tight as they'll go though, which means the tabs are always overlapped (how they always were for Emarie too!). He is also very close to getting out of 0-3 size and has started wearing a few 3-6 month things, all of that of course is due to length though. Most of the 3-6 stuff he is wearing now is one piece outfits, 3-6 month pants absolutely drown him! 

So yeah, this month has been let downs here and there, but I am so enjoying the little personality I see emerging from my son. He is such a joy and we certainly love him! Em is still warming up to him, but I think as he gets more interactive, she will come to enjoy him for sure!