Short End of the Stick

To start, Judy is doing amazingly well!  She's very joyful these days! However, my baby boy, Jackson, got some bad news yesterday. :( 

Jackson has always been really small. He weighed 6 pounds when he was born. Just a lil peanut! Lets just be honest, Michael and I aren't the tallest, so we never expected our kids to be tall.  Last year we started to get worried because the doctor said he wasn't consistently growing on his growth chart.  He has always been in the 3% for his height for his age.  But the past couple years, he dropped to below 1%.  Doctors didn't really need to tell us this, we already really knew! He the shortest kid in his class and he's the oldest kid in his class.  It's always bothered me, but this past year it has really started to bother Jackson! :( Kids make fun of him.  Kindergartners are taller than him.  Jackson is now 9 years old and in the 2nd grade.  (I held him from starting school till he was 6).

Anyway, pediatrician sent us to the endocrinologist at Riley Children's Hospital (our 2nd home now).  We met with the doctor at Riley 6 months ago. He measured Jack and took a bone xray of his left hand.  I guess the bone in your left hand can tell doctors how much more you are going to grow.  Doc said he wanted to see us in 6 months to check growth.  So, we had our appointment with this doctor yesterday.  Jackson has grown less than 1 inch in 6 months.  This keeps Jackson at the 1 percentile for his height.  Doc said he should be growing a lot more and at a faster rate.  The doctor believes he might have a growth hormone deficiency.  Jackson will have to do a growth hormone test.  This test will take 4 hours.  They take blood from him every 30 minutes and give him some short of medicine- this will show if there's a deficiency or not.  If there is a deficiency, we will discuss growth hormone injections as an option.  Michael and I feel so bad.  Our sweet lil Jackson! He's the nicest, sweetest, most loving lil boy.  He's really sensitive and so he took this news really hard yesterday.  It broke our hearts.  Doctor said if there were 100 nine year old boys, Jackson would be the shortest of all of them.  Jack heard this and put his sweet little head down.  Jack said, "Great, I don't want to be a midget."  He was really upset.  Jack said all he cares about it going to Kings Island and be able to ride all the roller coasters.  My heart broke... my heart aches... It was one thing when Michael and I noticed he was short but now that Jackson notices it- that kills us!!! Kids can be so mean these days, and I don't want my boy to be a subject to this!!

So the saga continues with the Spear's.  We were just starting to breath again.  Can't get cut a break.  I know things could always be worse, but THIS is hard! This is really hard for us.  We are tired.  Please pray that the Lord will give us strength and that my Jackson will be able to handle all this.  My sweet little boy. Oh how I love him!