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So far now. She's like 50 percentile, but our dr said she is growing beautifully according to HER curve so he's very happy.

I def obsess about her eating day to day, but overall weight-wise I haven't had a reason to be concerned yet.

Yes, all the time. Our LO was 5 weeks premature and has always been around the 5th percentile. At 15 months, he's still there, and really slim... doesn't help that he doesn't particularly like to eat or drink milk. That's our daily struggle!

I totally stressed out about this during the first year when LO would drop to a lower curve each visit (eventually dropping below the 1st percentile). At about 18 mo she settled into the 10th percentile curve and I stopped stressing out.

Not anymore. I used to be really concerned when he was a baby because he started off with a high percentile for weight and it just kept dropping and dropping. But we've been around the 10th percentile forever now (since ~9 months), so I've stopped worrying about it. He's maintained the same percentile for a long time, so I think that's just where he naturally falls. He's happy, healthy, and very bright!

My husband used to be really concerned too, but I just kept pointing out that HE was also slim and clearly our son had inherited his metabolism. And since he's maintained this percentile, my husband doesn't worry about it anymore, especially since the doctor isn't worried.

Maybe you can just turn it back around on your husband when he stresses about it: "The doctor isn't worried - why are you?" and point out that SOMEONE has to be in those lower percentiles just like someone has to be in those upper percentiles. Not all kids can be 50%!

Nah. She's always followed her growth chart and the ped says she's growing beautifully. That's enough for me.

as someone with a very small 2 year old, I get it. but we both stopped stressing when she turned a year old, because like you, our ped told us she's doing great and i think the message finally got through to us. I could sort of see him being a little more concerned because he's a boy, but I think maybe you need to encourage him to actually go to the next appt. maybe hearing it directly from the ped will help?

I stressed out my son's entire first year because he hated nursing, bottles, BM, formula, solids, whatever. Like, zero food motivation whatsoever. I think he would have preferred to live on air. He was really colicky and had bad reflux, so I feared he had this negative association with food. I was counting calories in my head and adding fat and oil to everything, he refused to self-feed with any regularity until 1, and and no one but my mom and I had the patience to go through the crazy task of feeding him several times a day.

But once we hit 1 year old, DH hit 50% for HIS curve and our pediatrician told us to relax. She told me if he got 8-12oz of milk a day he was fine and that his weight would probably drop anyway as a toddler and its totally normal even for GOOD eaters to eat hardly anything once they hit toddlerdom. And the phrase that really hit home with me: "You can't force them to eat at this point anyway."

We definitely have days where I question if my son has eaten anything but a few bites of banana, but then there will be weeks where he eats wonderfully and I know its balancing out. I just make sure he drinks 8oz of liquid a day (the dehyrdation point), which he always does between water and milk, and that we OFFER 3 balanced, calorie dense meals and 2 snacks a day.

I would just tell your husband you can't force your kid to eat - you can just try to steer them to healthy, nutrient dense foods and keep them happy.

Our 3 yo is not on the chart. The older he gets, the less I worry, but it's still often on my mind, especially because it's so hard to find pants that fit! His pediatrician is great and stresses how hard it is to gain weight at this age because they are growing and moving so fast and often sick. She's basically had a 2 lb goal for us for the past 2 years and we've met it each time. (He was 24bs at age 3). But of course he just got sick and clocked in at 23 which bothers me, but not a ton. He's still growing out of clothes (mostly by height) and his feet keep getting bigger (approx size 8) so I'm sure by the time he hits puberty he'll get bigger, but I'm not counting on it being anytime before then. (He was born at 25 weeks...)

I do and I don't. DD1 is quite small, she's sat at the 10th % since she was born ( SHe's 2.5 now.) She just had a check up this week and was still at the 10th%. I know that she's healthy looking, she's just small. But I get a ton of comments all.the.time. on how small she is. That's when I get worried, as sometimes I wonder if I'm not seeing her the way others see her. But, like the Dr said, it doesn't matter where they are on the scale, just that they don't drop below where they usually sit on the scale.

@Mrs. Carrot: oh wow, is 25 lbs at 2.5 not on the chart? I wonder what chart they are using. My 2.5 year old is under 25 lbs, but at her last sick visit they said she was in the 10-20% for weight and 50-75% for height. Sometimes I get interesting % for my infants weight too, so I like to compare to what other people's doctors are saying.

@Mrs. Carrot: gotcha. That makes sense.

@Anagram: @Mrs. Carrot: There are also different charts for preemies...fyi. I think our is called "Extremely low birth weight"

@MrsB2012: People's perceptions are so inaccurate! We actually get comments about how big my lo looks because he's about 15% for height and 1% for weight, so he appears taller (even though many of his classmates are a head taller than him).

I was slightly worried about my two daughters. My son has always been between the 20th and 50th percentile so I never worried about him.

DD1 was in the 90th percentile for weight for a little while even though she's always been active (climbs, runs, jumps, plays outside a lot!) and she eats very little so I wondered if there was a health problem. The ped sent her in for weight checks because she was only in the 50th percentile for height. As she got older, her weight slowed down and she grew a lot so she's now in the 77th percentile for weight and height and her ped isn't worried.

DD2, on the other hand, was in the 50th percentile for weight as a newborn and dropped to 20th at 4 months, 12th at 6 months and she wasn't even on the charts at 12 months. Her ped said she looked happy and healthy so there was no concern. I added coconut oil and butter to everything she ate and she finally went up to the 3rd percentile! It put me at ease. She's a great eater (she ate 3 pieces of pizza the other night ) so I was worried there was really nothing more I could do. She really doesn't stop moving either.

I used to worry a lot, and still do a bit, but I'm trying to listen to my doctor who says she's fine. She was born at the 99th percentile across the board and steadily dropped down to 20-25 by 18 months. Her doctor said she looks totally healthy and isn't worried, but sometimes I still wonder if her ped is right.

In the beginning I did because he dropped weight fast as a nb and had jaundice. Now I don't worry about him growth at all because frankly, he's huge. I did get a little concerned when he was being super picky about eating the past couple days, but I don't think he's sick, just asserting himself.

Dd has always been tiny. Not too surprising since I was too and I always heard stories about my mom being told by doctors to get me to eat more food/fattier foods.

But dd has always dropped percentiles. After her 6 months appointment, I think, our doctor wanted to come in for a weight check which she "passed." But at her 12 month visit she was down to the 0%ile (.4% technically) so we scheduled another weight check which is this Friday.

So overall I'm not really concerned but the fact our doctor wants to keep scheduling weight checks is a little stressful.

I don't. The only way I'd worry is if she started losing weight. I was a tiny but healthy child.

Yes with my older DS. He was born small, totally fell off the growth chart and has major issues with food. At one point his doctor said we were one cold away from hospitalization. So yes, I do really worry about it!

I worried with our first until age 2. Low birth weight (5 lb 5 oz, 17.5 inches) and wasn't on the charts for a long time. He finally got on the chart at 1% and followed it there for a long, long time. But I think the biggest thing was that he wasn't a great drinker. Didn't love nursing, didn't drink a ton from bottles. So his size was one thing, but the fact that he didn't eat well made it a lot worse. At 1, he was 18 lbs even. He didn't hit 20 lbs until after 18 months. And then hit the picky age so I worried more until age 2. His eating habits became a little more clear at that age - he eats enough, but he eats slowly and grazes throughout the day. At age 3, he was 27.5 lbs. Still tiny. But healthy, happy, and thriving in all respects. My husband still tries to make him more than he wants, which annoys me, but he doesn't fixate on size, so that's good.

My second was also low birth weight (5 lb 6 oz, 19 inches) but loves to eat. Nursed all day, loved solids. Very food motivated. He is also small (5% most of his first year) and was 19.5 lbs at a year. I just didn't worry since he ate well and gained on his own curve and had been through it with my first.