Monday, July 25, 2011

Doctor's Orders

I feel like I got in trouble today. My son had his 2 and a half year check-up earlier and everything was tip-top as usual. He's a great kid and we're so lucky that he's healthy and always gets the A+ from the doctor, but my husband and I were told that we need to do a couple things.

The first thing the doctor wants us to do involves milk. My son loves milk. No, that doesn't quite cut it...he LOVES it with a bazillion capital letters times a million. It's become his routine to have a little bit of chocolate milk when he wakes up, a little plain milk around naptime, and little more plain milk after dinner. Because he's been so picky with eating, the doctor wants us to cut milk down to 1 cup per day. I realize now, after it's been five hours since his appointment, that the doctor probably thinks we're giving him more than we actually are, but I'm willing to comply if it means he'll eat better. A kid can only eat so much pizza, waffles and fruit, right? The outcome of this little experiment remains to be seen, but I'm willing to bet that cutting out one glass of milk won't make much difference because, well, I do have a two year old after all!


Homework assignment #2 from the doctor: get my son back to taking naps. He decided a couple months ago, on his own, that he didn't need naps anymore. I wasn't very pleased at first, but he wasn't getting over-tired and it sure made running errands a lot easier. I figured that as long as he had an early bedtime, he'd be just fine. Well, the past week or so has gotten pretty hard. He hasn't going to bed as early as I'd like so around 5 o'clock, my son would grab his blanket, bunch it up like a pillow, and then try to fall asleep on the couch. This was just not a good idea if I wanted him to keep that "no-later-than-8-o'clock" bedtime. There were a few times when I'd have to get him up off the couch and try my hardest to keep him awake. Basically, the whole no nap thing was just not working anymore. Well, we have to try to get back on that nap schedule which is going to be a big challenge. It must be done not just for my sanity, but also for the kid who's become Mr. Super Cranky-Pants around 4pm. I'm happy to report that after a good half hour of arguing (and unfortunately a little milk to help the process), today was successful and he's currently snoring away. I do have to wonder how many future nap struggles I'll have though. I also have to wonder if the grandmas (who sometimes babysit) will be softies like I've been...

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