Two Year Pediatrician Visit

This morning we took the boys to their two year appointment. Hard to believe that they only go once a year now! I'm sure we'll have reason to go back between now and next May but amazing that we're already on a yearly schedule for regular visits.

In terms of growth, the boys continue to grow according to their curve. Theo is in the 15-20th percentile for everything, and Beck is in the 25-50th percentile for everything. Today the nurse measured them as identical in height, which of course they are not, so I don't have the greatest of confidence in the accuracy of the measurements, but I record them here for what it's worth.

We got a referral for Early Intervention for Theo because I expressed some concern that his verbal development lags a little behind Beckett's. Whereas Beck routinely expresses ideas with two or three words, Theo still rarely uses more than one word at a time. Both know and use lots of nouns and positional words (e.g. off, on, over, open, close), Theo uses fewer words regularly. His ears have had some fluid buildup every time they have been checked for the last six months, which I am concerned is having an impact on his ability to hear and make language. There is no question that Theo understands as much as Beckett does about what is going on and being said around him, but he cannot enunciate, or express what he wants, as clearly as Beck can. My impression is that our pediatrician is not concerned but wants to rule out any possible delay or, if there is a delay, gather as much information as possible to determine our best course of action. We are going to bring Theo back in a month to re-check his ears. If Early Intervention believes he may have a hearing problem, we may get his hearing tested. Though he has not had persistent ear infections (just three last fall) the concern is that the fluid in his ears affects his ability to hear and make language. Tubes in his ears may be a good course of action if he does have a language delay and ongoing fluid in his ears and we think the fluid is affecting his hearing. Since this is such an important time for developing language skills, we don't want him to miss out because he has underlying hearing problems. Theo has such an expressive face and tries so hard to verbalize his feelings that we do not want him to become too frustrated that he stops trying, or gets too far behind during this important time. So we'll keep an eye on it and revisit the idea of tubes when we have more information.

Theo and Beck are in for a great few days with Grandma Joanie and Grandpa Stu as Jeff and I head down to Philadelphia tomorrow morning to celebrate Jeff's graduation from his LLM program. It will be great to see our dear friend Aaron and enjoy some time in Philadelphia to ourselves!