Friday, June 19, 2009

I Could be a Dietitian

Becca had her appointment with the Pediatric Cardiologist this morning. Wow, that was quite a production. The appointment was at 8am and we were for three hours.

I have mixed feelings about it. Dave and I and Dave's mom went and Becca's mom met us there. It was a lot of peeps to cram into one exam room!

We saw three different people. First the RN came in to talk to us about the whole situation. She went over Becca's lab results from the blood test and asked us tons of questions about her diet and her level of activity. We were probably with her for about an hour.

After that, the dietician came in. She asked us some more questions about Becca's diet and then basically just went over the food wheel with us. To be honest with you (and not to sound arrogant) but she really didn't tell me much that I didn't already know. She didn't give us a prescribed diet plan, she just wrote down how many servings of each food group that we should be giving Becca and made some recommendations about certain foods. For instance, she told us that we should only be drinking low fat milk, yogurt and cheese. We already do that. Well, except for the cheese. I buy regular fat cheese for myself because I am a princess and I don't like low fat cheese, but have been buying 2% cheese for Becca for a while now. She eats it with no complaints. (Sidebar: Kraft makes 2% cheddar slices that are one serving individually wrapped which are actually quite tasty.)

After the dietitian was finished we saw the doctor. We had already decided before she came in that if she was told us that we needed to put Becca on medication that we were going to refuse. All three of us were in agreement on that. But she did no recommend medication, so it was a non-issue. She said she felt confident that we can fix this with diet and exercise. Which I would say I agree with.

And that was it. We have to go back in January. They will check her blood again then and we'll see where we are at.

Here is where my mixed feelings come into play. In a way, I think this was a good thing as far as it will force everyone to get on board with making sure the kid eats better. It brought attention to an issue that I have been tearing my hair out about for a couple of years now. But it really wasn't anything earth shattering. I'm curious to see how much of this my health insurance covers because, like I said, the dietitian didn't tell me anything I didn't already know. If Dave's mom and the other would have just listened to me in the first place, we wouldn't have to do this. I don't mean to sound like I never give the kid bad food because in the past 6-8 months I had kind of given up and probably wasn't doing all that well with her myself.....

So, in a nutshell, this is considered preventative maintenance. Her cholesterol is high, her triglycerides are slightly high. She needs to eat better and exercise more. It's not rocket science. Hopefully all parties involved can work as a team to make sure the problem gets better, not worse.

And that's all I have to say about that.

2 comments:

Jen said...

It does sound like an ordeal, but I'm glad everyone's sort of on the same page.

The Nut House... said...

People can be such a box of rocks sometimes. I can tell my parents things, over and over again but when someone in scrubs, or a white lab coat tells them, that's when they believe it... but temporarily.

Hang in there. They just needed to hear it from someone else. Plus the extent of that appointment may have hit the point home with them.