Health Check: What to Worry About First?

I pity my child’s pediatrician.

Although he says he is used to it, I’m sure he tires of how a simple, routine check-up turns into a criminal interrogation with me.

Being a first-time parent, I have a thousand questions about my daughter’s health, development and general well-being.

Add in the daily news udpates about arsenic in apple juice and I have a thousand more to add to my list.

At CeCe’s one-year check-up, she was given a clean bill of health. But that didn’t stop my mind from racing with worry.

Here are the highlights of what I believe most moms are concerned with lately:

* Cold weather illnesses
Colds, flu, sinus infections, croup – all of these are creeping up. I’ve got the air humidifier running full blast and a nasal aspirator in a holster on my hip.

No matter how I try, I can never seem to protect CeCe from becoming a human snot factory in the winter.

I know we can’t dose our babies with Sudafed, but try squirting saline into the booger-encrusted nose of a one-year-old. Yikes!

* Nutrition
In our exploration of new foods, I’ve learned that when CeCe doesn’t like something she will throw it on the floor.

But pleasing a toddler’s palette is near impossible. She devoured lima beans one week and refused them the next. The daily diet of a toddler remains a mystery to me.

* Sleep
Not sleep for me, of course. Parents never get a full night’s sleep ever again, I’ve accepted it.

But nap times for baby are becoming shorter and fewer. Any way we can change this back?

* To vaccinate or not to vaccinate
In my house, the answer is always to vaccinate.

I know mothers who are adamant that vaccines are the underlying cause for autism and delayed brain development.

So if you don’t want to vaccinate your child, that is up to you.

Just don’t expect me to get our kids together for a play date until you do.