An 8-month old baby in Guangzhou has gained much media attention for weighing 17.5kg (38.58 lbs) the average weight for a 4.5 year old. Little Yoyo (pronounced Yaw-yaw) is 78 centimetres tall (the average height for an 18 month-old) and has to wear clothes designed for a five year-old child, Guangzhou Daily reported yesterday.

Yoyo being held by his grandma, image courtesy of Guangzhou Daily

Even though he is so large that he has to wear adult incontinence pads because no diapers are large enough for him, his mother Mrs. Bian insists that his eating habits are not unhealthy, unusual or excessive. “He only consumes breast milk,” she says.

In a city where good nannies don’t come cheap, Yoyo’s parents picked a bad time to have a baby that most adults struggle to carry around. The family’s ayi has already quit, claiming that it is like looking after three children.

However, the parents do get some respite. “Luckily his sleeping patterns are excellent,” Yoyo’s mother told the paper. “He’ll go to bed at nine and sleep for six straight hours every time.”

But the hardest part of the family’s day is taking Yoyo out because he never fails to draw a crowd. One time when out shopping in Tianhe, over 100 people crowded around to get a glimpse of the super-sized baby. Strangers even track them down and visit their house to get a look.

It’s a mystery why he has grown so fast. At birth, he was 4.3 kg (9.48 lbs) which is large but not unheard of. Neither of the parents come from families of particularly huge people.

Mrs. Bian has become slightly hypochondriac since becoming a mother, according to their physician Dr. Zheng. She takes the baby for a check-up every 15 days, even though the only thing that has ever been found to be wrong with him was a slight calcium shortage.

(Front page image is not Yoyo, is from Century China)