Piper’s Checkup and Thyroid Issues

Today, we were brave.

I’m not sure who was the most brave, however.  Addy, for having to have four shots.  Piper, for having to have a blood draw, me for taking both of them, or my poor mom who came along to help toddler-wrangle for the duration.

Yeah, it was a great day.

Adalynn had her 6-month checkup (albeit a tad late) and Piper had “just” a checkup, too.  So the logical thing to do is have both appointments together, right??? 

I’m starting to rethink that philosophy.

Anyway, Piper was 22 pounds even (12-ish%) and was 32 1/2 inches (MORE than the 25% on the Ds chart!!!  FIRST TIME EVER!)

We let Piper “go” first with the doctor so that she could get outta there and run around the hospital while we finished up with Adalynn.  Turned out to be a good call; she was fed up with the exam room exactly 8.6 seconds after we arrived.  And that’s probably a little generous; I don’t think she was in the mood when we left the weigh-in room. 

Anyway, Piper’s visit was pretty much just a weight check.  But, as usual, I always like to add a little more to the mix.  When we were in Vail, we met a guy who has a son with Ds and who also works for Social Security.  Piper’s never had a karyotype done after the amnio; we have no post-birth verification that she does, indeed, have Down syndrome.  Apparently that’s not so cool (and required for SSA), so we needed to rectify it.  AND, apparently, verification from early in life is required, as well, because if you only have verification when they’re an adult, it doesn’t mean that they’ve had it their whole life (yeah- are you rolling your eyes, too???)  Anyway, I brought it up with the doctor and she agreed that we really ought to have a postnatal confirmation (as if anyone is questioning it, right?)  Timing worked out, though, because we needed to recheck her thyroid today after a few goofy readings at her two-year checkup, so we could do it all in one poke and be done.  At least that was the hope…  We also got a referral for speech therapy through Children’s (the wait list is several months long to get in; hoping that by getting on the wait list now we can get her in when she ages out of EI in May.) 

After her appointment, we wandered down the hallway to the lab.  Or, as Piper would call it, The Worst Place on Earth and I HATE You Here.  The thyroid screen doesn’t take a whole lot of blood, so they’ve done finger pricks on her before (which are traumatizing, too, because she has to be squeezed the whole time- which she does not like.)  But this time, since we were adding the chromosomal study, they had to go in the arm.  I was pretty much okay with that (hoping it was better than the squeeze).  That is until they couldn’t find a single vein in her little arms.  Tried the first arm, went to the second.  “Thought” they had a good one.  Poked, prodded (Piper screamed.  Ranted.  Screamed) and dug some more.  Finally got the vein, but couldn’t get it to “give” anything.  Fantastic.  Had to go back to the first arm and try again.  You can imagine what Piper thought of that.  It was pretty awful.  But at least they got it on the first time in the second arm (no digging!) and then she was done quick.  Poor kid had red dots all up and down her arms from it.  She looked at me with those eyes of “WHY are you letting them do this to me???”  I’m pretty sure she was high on adrenaline for a good couple hours after that…

The thyroid tests came back tonight and her TSH is barely elevated, but elevated nonetheless.  So I guess we’ll retest again in a few months.  And the part that really bugs me is the blood test, not the thyroid.  Go figure.  Does it always have to be something???