Brian has made quite a bit of progress with his torticollis! Today, Elizabeth, the PT, was extremely impressed with both his turning radius and the improvement he's showing with the head tilt. He is able to turn fully in all positions now, although he still wants to bring his shoulder forward a bit when he's sitting up. And, his tilt rarely even surfaces except when he's tired. This is especially impressive given his new skill (crawling) because typically kids who have this issue, revert to titling when they are learning something new.
She dropped him down to 2 sets of stretches a day (down from 5) and we just have to keep working on his tilt exercises as much as possible until our next session in 2 weeks. Elizabeth said that if he's still looking this good next time, we will start meeting every 4 weeks!!
On a side note, Elizabeth taught Brian to go from a crawling position to a sitting position in about 10 minutes today. She wanted him to learn this skill because it forces him to use his neck muscles to keep his head up while transitioning. I was amazed that he picked it up so fast. He is getting so mobile! His crawling has gotten faster and a bit more agile, and he's getting braver with it. He's attempting longer distances, and trying like crazy to pull up on things when he reaches them. I know I will probably hate it in a few weeks when I can't keep up with him, but it's so awesome to see him movin' and groovin'!
Showing posts with label torticollis. Show all posts
Showing posts with label torticollis. Show all posts
Wednesday, March 18, 2009
Tuesday, March 3, 2009
Excellent News!
Brian and I had two appointments today. The first was PT. Elizabeth, the physical therapist, continued to praise me and Brian for his improvements. He is holding his head level most of the time now. We still need to work on full turns to the left when he's sitting and pushing up on his arms, and we will continue to do the stretches that we've been doing since PT began.
The second appointment was at the Brace Shop. Brian's helmet has been sliding around on his head a lot, so he needed to have a piece of foam added to the inside to keep it in place. Greg, the orthotist went ahead and measured his head since we were supposed to do that next week. Brian's head had a 10 mm difference on the diagonals when he was first measured before the helmet. He now has a 7 mm difference, which is about a 30% improvement! They also have some way of measuring the flat area, which I don't really understand. However, his head was showing a 6% flatness before the helmet. Now it's at 2%! So, as much as I hate the helmet, at least it's working! Yay :)
The second appointment was at the Brace Shop. Brian's helmet has been sliding around on his head a lot, so he needed to have a piece of foam added to the inside to keep it in place. Greg, the orthotist went ahead and measured his head since we were supposed to do that next week. Brian's head had a 10 mm difference on the diagonals when he was first measured before the helmet. He now has a 7 mm difference, which is about a 30% improvement! They also have some way of measuring the flat area, which I don't really understand. However, his head was showing a 6% flatness before the helmet. Now it's at 2%! So, as much as I hate the helmet, at least it's working! Yay :)
Tuesday, February 24, 2009
Two Cases to Crack
We have had two mysterious things happen over the past few days...
Case #1, we'll call it "The Curious Case of the Random 'No,'" started on Thursday I believe. Brian has been shaking his head "no" at random times and for no apparent reason. He doesn't know the to say "no" yet, and even if he did, this shaking is not connected to questions, or things he doesn't want to do, so he's definitely not responding with the word "no." He first did it on Thursday in the car when the sun was shining in his face. This, I assumed, was his way of getting the sun out of his face. David, one of the Banta kids, reported it and thought it was hilarious. Brian continued this behavior on Friday when I was tutoring. I was singing the "Shake Your Booty Song" while holding him, and he started shaking his head back and forth. Again, I thought it was cute, and didn't think much more about it. However, by Friday night, he was doing it more often, and at totally random and unexplainable times. For instance, at Target, he started shaking his head back and forth in the cart while we were walking through the store. This, Shawn pointed out to him, didn't help the fact that people already assume he's "special" because of the helmet. Given that Brian is 8 months old (TODAY ACTUALLY!), this reasoning did not stop him from playing his new game.
Shawn's statement made me suddenly nervous about the behavior. As the weekend went on, Brian continued to shake his head sporadically. So, I called my Aunt Sarah who's a pediatrician and asked her advice. She said to have his eyes and ears checked, and to consult with the physical therapist. I sent the PT an email right away, and made an appointment at our pediatrician's office for Monday (yesterday) morning.
The pediatrician checked his ears, eyes, nose, throat and breathing and there were no issues-a relief. The PT called me on Monday (she's WONDERFUL) and told me that she has seen kids move their heads more, and in weird ways while undergoing PT for torticolis. She thinks it's because they are so much more aware of their head and neck since we are constantly messing with them to do the stretches and exercises. This made sense to me, so I feel much better about Brian's new behavior. Both cautioned to not call attention to it, or laugh about it, as Brian may pick up on this and continue to do it as a result!
Case #2, we are calling "The Case of the Missing Poo." Yesterday morning, Brian pushed out a small little poo while eating breakfast. For anyone who has witnessed him eating, this is not uncommon. It seems that if something goes in, something must also come out! Anyway, I cleaned the oatmeal off of his face when he had finished eating, and took him to the changing table to change the diaper. Brian's poo is quite ball-like at the moment, and would you believe the little turd rolled out of the diaper and over the back of the changing table before I could stop it?! Well, I swear it did! Anyway, what are you going to do, right? So I cleaned up his little tushie, put a new diaper on, and put him in the crib so I could begin searching for the poo.
I began by extending my arm toward the back of the changing table from the front and running it all along the back wall. No poo, but I did find some very large dust bunnies. Next, I tried moving the dresser to look. I couldn't find it anywhere! The dresser/changing table is pretty heavy, so this task had taken a lot out of me. I began to think maybe I was just crazy and I had imagined it. So, I checked the freshly changed trashcan and inside of the diaper to see if maybe I had disposed of the poo without realizing it. Nope! At this point, I figured, it wouldn't hurt to just wait to continue my search until Shawn got home and could completely move the dresser to help me look. So, I sent him an email explaining the little problem. Can you believe he didn't even respond? I mean, really, if your signifgant other wrote you an email telling you they had lost poo, would you not at least wrote back some sarcastic comment?
Anyway, when Shawn got home, we reconvened the search, this time armed with flashlights. Even with a helper and flashlights, we never did find the poo! So, this case is, for now, unsolved. Any thoughts on where it might have gone? Our best bets are on Ruben's belly. Yum!
Case #1, we'll call it "The Curious Case of the Random 'No,'" started on Thursday I believe. Brian has been shaking his head "no" at random times and for no apparent reason. He doesn't know the to say "no" yet, and even if he did, this shaking is not connected to questions, or things he doesn't want to do, so he's definitely not responding with the word "no." He first did it on Thursday in the car when the sun was shining in his face. This, I assumed, was his way of getting the sun out of his face. David, one of the Banta kids, reported it and thought it was hilarious. Brian continued this behavior on Friday when I was tutoring. I was singing the "Shake Your Booty Song" while holding him, and he started shaking his head back and forth. Again, I thought it was cute, and didn't think much more about it. However, by Friday night, he was doing it more often, and at totally random and unexplainable times. For instance, at Target, he started shaking his head back and forth in the cart while we were walking through the store. This, Shawn pointed out to him, didn't help the fact that people already assume he's "special" because of the helmet. Given that Brian is 8 months old (TODAY ACTUALLY!), this reasoning did not stop him from playing his new game.
Shawn's statement made me suddenly nervous about the behavior. As the weekend went on, Brian continued to shake his head sporadically. So, I called my Aunt Sarah who's a pediatrician and asked her advice. She said to have his eyes and ears checked, and to consult with the physical therapist. I sent the PT an email right away, and made an appointment at our pediatrician's office for Monday (yesterday) morning.
The pediatrician checked his ears, eyes, nose, throat and breathing and there were no issues-a relief. The PT called me on Monday (she's WONDERFUL) and told me that she has seen kids move their heads more, and in weird ways while undergoing PT for torticolis. She thinks it's because they are so much more aware of their head and neck since we are constantly messing with them to do the stretches and exercises. This made sense to me, so I feel much better about Brian's new behavior. Both cautioned to not call attention to it, or laugh about it, as Brian may pick up on this and continue to do it as a result!
Case #2, we are calling "The Case of the Missing Poo." Yesterday morning, Brian pushed out a small little poo while eating breakfast. For anyone who has witnessed him eating, this is not uncommon. It seems that if something goes in, something must also come out! Anyway, I cleaned the oatmeal off of his face when he had finished eating, and took him to the changing table to change the diaper. Brian's poo is quite ball-like at the moment, and would you believe the little turd rolled out of the diaper and over the back of the changing table before I could stop it?! Well, I swear it did! Anyway, what are you going to do, right? So I cleaned up his little tushie, put a new diaper on, and put him in the crib so I could begin searching for the poo.
I began by extending my arm toward the back of the changing table from the front and running it all along the back wall. No poo, but I did find some very large dust bunnies. Next, I tried moving the dresser to look. I couldn't find it anywhere! The dresser/changing table is pretty heavy, so this task had taken a lot out of me. I began to think maybe I was just crazy and I had imagined it. So, I checked the freshly changed trashcan and inside of the diaper to see if maybe I had disposed of the poo without realizing it. Nope! At this point, I figured, it wouldn't hurt to just wait to continue my search until Shawn got home and could completely move the dresser to help me look. So, I sent him an email explaining the little problem. Can you believe he didn't even respond? I mean, really, if your signifgant other wrote you an email telling you they had lost poo, would you not at least wrote back some sarcastic comment?
Anyway, when Shawn got home, we reconvened the search, this time armed with flashlights. Even with a helper and flashlights, we never did find the poo! So, this case is, for now, unsolved. Any thoughts on where it might have gone? Our best bets are on Ruben's belly. Yum!
Monday, January 26, 2009
PT and Flu Shot
Today was Brian's physical therapy evaluation at Children's in Northern Kentucky. Shawn got to go since he had taken the day off tonight. We met with a PT named Elizabeth Oliverio. She was very nice and young, and Brian liked her a lot. This is not unusual, of course, since he tends to like everyone!
It turns out that Brian has torticollis, which means his neck muscles are tight on one side (in his case the right side). This is correctable with physical therapy. She gave us 2 exercises to do with him 4-5 times daily and we have to hold him in a specific way to make him use his neck muscles in a way that will strengthen them. We will go back to Children's to see Elizabeth bi-weekly until he's "cured." Mostly this is on us to correct at home. She will just be checking in to make sure it's working and to adapt the exercises as necessary.
After the PT appointment we ran across the street to Dr. Price's office and Brian got his booster flu shot. He was asleep in the waiting room, and woke up when we put him down on the table for his shot. He didn't even notice that the shot went it and actually SMILED at the nurse when she was putting the bandaid on. She said that NEVER happens! He has such a wonderful disposition :)
He's napping now, and gets to enjoy an appointment free day tomorrow. So we will wait for 2009 blizzard that's supposed to arrive tonight and with any luck enjoy a snow day tomorrow!
It turns out that Brian has torticollis, which means his neck muscles are tight on one side (in his case the right side). This is correctable with physical therapy. She gave us 2 exercises to do with him 4-5 times daily and we have to hold him in a specific way to make him use his neck muscles in a way that will strengthen them. We will go back to Children's to see Elizabeth bi-weekly until he's "cured." Mostly this is on us to correct at home. She will just be checking in to make sure it's working and to adapt the exercises as necessary.
After the PT appointment we ran across the street to Dr. Price's office and Brian got his booster flu shot. He was asleep in the waiting room, and woke up when we put him down on the table for his shot. He didn't even notice that the shot went it and actually SMILED at the nurse when she was putting the bandaid on. She said that NEVER happens! He has such a wonderful disposition :)
He's napping now, and gets to enjoy an appointment free day tomorrow. So we will wait for 2009 blizzard that's supposed to arrive tonight and with any luck enjoy a snow day tomorrow!
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