Fed up with Pediatrician

[gcvfish]

Hi! I'm new here and have been lurking for quite some time now... But wanted advice from you folks.

My pedi has been concerned about my LO's weight gain. He's been growing, but has been around the same weight for about 2 1/2 months now. Which is around 18lb 13 oz.

Recently I have been eating a lot of raw and drinking a lot of green Smoothies, which my LO really loves! When this was mentioned to my pedi (Becuase he wanted me to start giving my LO meats for iron) I mentioned that he loved drinking green smoothies, and he basically dismissed it saying that meats would be a better source of iron... .I was dumbfounded. And then I said, that I wanted to give him fresh fruits and veggies (the ones he could acutally chew) instead of his jarred food, and again... He said it maybe once a day, but he'd rather him have the jarred food... THEN on top of that, he wanted me to quit breastfeeding and start giving him formula.... This one took the cake... By then I was really upset and just couldn't believe what I was hearing.

Anywho... The Doctor wanted to get blood work done to make sure he wasn't anemic (Mind you they checked his iron levels 4 weeks ago and they were above normal) and urine samples. DH and I went along with it becuase we thought, hey maybe something is going on, we need to know about. Well after 20 minutes of them poking and proding my poor little baby and them still not being able to get in his little veins, enough was enough. They wanted us to go to a Children's hospital to try and get the blood again, but I can't bring myself to put my son through all that again when all I see is a bouncing, happy, energetic, healthy little boy.
DH and I decided that we are going to pump the little guy full of fresh and healthy food (no more jarred food or unhealthy "adult food") for the next month until his 12 month Well check up and if he still doesn't gain weight then we'll talk about additional tests.

Thanks for sticking through my rant. My question and plea for advice is, what are some nuts and seeds I can put in his smoothies to give him healthy fats. I know I can up his intake of avocado and I will start steaming some veggies for him to munch on throughout the day... Fruits, he takes with no problem (He already has all 8 front teeth and a molar) I just don't know if I can stick the seeds and nuts straight in the smoothie and lt them get blended with the rest of the stuff or if it will be best to grind them up with a coffee grinder first and then give it to him. Thanks so much in advance for those of you who got through this and respond!! Any other healthy food ideas are greatly appreciated.

[Living Food]

As a general rule, the average doctor knows virtually nothing at all about nutrition (or health, for that matter), and nutritionists and dietitians really aren't any better. There are rare exceptions, but it seems like your doctor isn't one of them.

You can soak flax seeds and add them to smoothies, and you can make nut milks with most nuts and use them as the base for smoothies (there are many recipes on this site if you search for them). Another good thing you could try is to make fermented nut and seed cheeses and give those to your child; he'd probably love those. Sprouted sunflower seeds would also make a good snack.

It doesn't really add many calories, but you might want to try adding spirulina (an algae) to his smoothies - just a little bit at first, because a very small percentage of people are allergic to it. Spirulina is jam-packed with nutrients, including the elusive gamma linolenic acid, which is vital to a baby's brain development. It's almost as good a source as mother's milk. It also has extremely high levels of iron if that's a concern - a tablespoon has 21 milligrams, about as much as 5 medium steaks! It doesn't have the most pleasant taste until you get used to it, though, so that's another reason to start with only a little. Seaweed is almost as good nutritionally, although it has less iron.

Also just for nutritional value, you could try sprouting greens such as alfalfa and adding those to the smoothies too. Sprouts have amazing quantities of nutrients on account of their being the freshest food possible. Sprouts also have huge amounts of vital life energy (a difficult concept for some people to grasp, but all living things do), which is a very important nutrient in it's own right...and one that is lacking from almost everyone's diet these days. Raw food helps provide some, but most people eat mainly weeks old store-bought food where most of the nutrients and energy have disappeared long before they eat it. Even a little fresh sprouts every day can help compensate for this.

By the way, the more blood he has drawn, the lower his iron and other nutrient levels will be.

How old is he?

[gcvfish]

Thanks for the info!! He is 11 months old today. They didn't end up getting any blood today because they couldn't get the needle in his vein, and wanted us to go to the hospital to try again and I refused.

How would I go about starting my own sprouts. Is it something a health food store wold be able to help me with?

Also every weekend we have sort of like a flea market where all local organic farmers come to sell their produce weekly so I plan on going there tomorrow and getting enough greens and fruits to hopefully last boh of us for the week.

[Living Food]

Go to this thread for some good sprouting info. You can order sprouts online, and some healthfood stores have seeds you can sprout.

[Living Food]

Food from local farmers is much better then store-bought food, especially if it was picked recently like most farmers markets do. In terms of freshness (and nutritional value) I rate foods like this:

1. Sprouts
2. Weeds
*
*
3. Fresh local produce
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
4. Store-bought produce


The spaces are significant.

[Raw Angel Mom]

This upset me when i read your post, because it brings me back in the past with my daughter. She was radiant of health and to keep people happy i had agreed to blood work. Thinking it would be only one sample they did 10 of them. My daughter was traumatized and it took her a while to recover. The good news is that, they couldn't any more put pressure on me because her blood work was great and she has no deficiency. The amino acid were above average.

If your child is 11 months, use hemp seeds in the smoothie (omega 3/6 and have a lot essential amino acid), give tone of fruits, young coconut milk etc.... I WOULDN'T give nuts yet, your baby cans develop allergies, i would wait. Truly goes with fruits. You can soak gojji berries for extra source of vitamin such iron, vitamin A and C.

I agree they are clue less. Try to find another doctor. Have you stop nursing????

All the best!

p.s I read that e3live is ok to give to baby. Please research, i am not a doctor. I gave that to my child but she was older.

[drraw]

The problem here is that raw food and natural methods mix with "traditional" doctors as well as oil and water do. As stated above, they have no nutritional training and if you spend enough time around them, you see they have a quasi-religious view of their practice -- if they didn't learn it in med school or it wasn't sent to them as an approved method by the AMA, it doesn't exist. Even if you show it to them with visible results, it wasn't clinically proven. One of my clients is an endocrinologist and she has a large poster in her office with a strange graphic entitled "If you are too open minded, then your brains will eventually fall out." I think that about sums up a typical MD's attitude.

Another word of caution would be to tread lightly on them with mentioning alternative issues. They all have God complexes and if they think you are doing something that would harm the child like feeding too much raw food, they are apt to call CPS.

--drraw

[gcvfish]

Food from local farmers is much better then store-bought food, especially if it was picked recently like most farmers markets do. In terms of freshness (and nutritional value) I rate foods like this:

1. Sprouts
2. Weeds
*
*
3. Fresh local produce
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
4. Store-bought produce


The spaces are significant.

That's interesting, I never thought of food losing their nutritional value because of long shipment and shelf lives until I came across this site. Thanks so much for all the info.

[gcvfish]

This upset me when i read your post, because it brings me back in the past with my daughter. She was radiant of health and to keep people happy i had agreed to blood work. Thinking it would be only one sample they did 10 of them. My daughter was traumatized and it took her a while to recover. The good news is that, they couldn't any more put pressure on me because her blood work was great and she has no deficiency. The amino acid were above average.

If your child is 11 months, use hemp seeds in the smoothie (omega 3/6 and have a lot essential amino acid), give tone of fruits, young coconut milk etc.... I WOULDN'T give nuts yet, your baby cans develop allergies, i would wait. Truly goes with fruits. You can soak gojji berries for extra source of vitamin such iron, vitamin A and C.

I agree they are clue less. Try to find another doctor. Have you stop nursing????

All the best!

No I havent stopped nursing, although he has shown a lot more interest in food when he's hungry than wanting milk. I still nurse him at as much as he wants during the day and he wakes up 3-20( ok maybe 20 times is a bit much but sometimes itfeels like that!!!) times during the night to nurse.

[gcvfish]

DRRAW - I am really seriously considering finding another doctor for him. I agree with you complelely on the outlook of MDs. Its absolutley rediculous. I won't even get started or this post will end up way too long ! I would love for us to go see a naturopathic doctor but they are not yet allowed to practice in my state, so the next best thing is to switch to a DO doctor.....

[MysticTree]

Or move state.

[Living Food]

Thanks so much for all the info.

You're welcome :)

[Raw Angel Mom]

No I havent stopped nursing, although he has shown a lot more interest in food when he's hungry than wanting milk. I still nurse him at as much as he wants during the day and he wakes up 3-20( ok maybe 20 times is a bit much but sometimes itfeels like that!!!) times during the night to nurse.

Well, another reason to be even less worry. Your providing great source of nutrient to this little. I would continue nursing up to 2 years old to be on the safe side but you are the mommy and you will know when it is time to stop.

Give him as much fruits he wants. It is a simple food that require not much to digest and is loaded with nutrient and sugar for their brain.

All the best!

[gcvfish]

Well, another reason to be even less worry. Your providing great source of nutrient to this little. I would continue nursing up to 2 years old to be on the safe side but you are the mommy and you will know when it is time to stop.

Give him as much fruits he wants. It is a simple food that require not much to digest and is loaded with nutrient and sugar for their brain.

All the best!

My original plan was to breastfeed him until he was ready to quit. I'm currently pregnant with my second due at the end of November, and I really don't know if I'm up to tandem nursing, but I'm totally not ready to wean him yet. So we'll see how it goes.

[adobegirl]

We had similar issues with our grandson. We finally just started telling the Dr what he wanted to hear. The tests proved he was healthy so we didn't feel bad omitting information. Even now, at his last checkup, the Dr asked how many glasses of milk he drank. We said 3-4. Because he does some days... but it's almond milk (he is older now). he didn't specifically ask if it was cow's milk and we didn't specifically say it wasn't. As long as he is thriving (and some children are just smaller than others) and doing well, I think it's fine. I'm not saying lie to the Dr though... but I guess we did through omission.