Day 105 - Off to the doctor we go

Today, we had an appointment with a Pediatric Rehabilitation Therapist. During Kaiya's last well baby check up, the pediatrician noted that the flat spot on the right side of her head was pretty...flat. We haven't been diligent in keeping her head rotated when she sleeps, so she has a dent. The pediatrician recommended a helmet in the next few months and I immediately stopped her. Helmet? I asked if there were any intermediate steps we could take to ensure a helmet would be needed...and she recommended physical therapy.

So then, after she gave me the number to the physical therapy location, I procrastinated. I thought I may be jumping the gun..because after all, it would just be a dent in the back of her head. Allie's hair is so full that if SHE had a dent, you wouldn't be able to tell...so why should I worry about Kaiya?!

Well - we went today. And now I know why it is so important to ensure your kid DOESN'T have a dent. The dent on the back side of one side, ends up shifting the features on the front of the opposite side!! And Kaiya's forehead and ears have already begun to shift! As soon as the therapist told us this - I was ready to slap a helmet on the girl right then and there!

It turns out that Kaiya has a mild condition of what is called Left Torticollis / Plagiocephaly...which is a fancy way of saying that her neck is tight on the left side, causing her to want to mainly lay or look to the right. As far as her dent goes on the scale of Mild to Moderate to Severe, she's in the middle of the Moderate range and won't need a helmet now. The Physical Therapy exercises to stretch out that neck muscle should help her feel more comfortable laying on the right side of her head. We'll see. But we'll have to go to Physical Therapy now for a few months and I hope that she does well with it! She didn't care to have that neck stretched out during our session and let's face it...when it comes to that baby crying in pain..I'm a wimp! But I know it's the best thing for her.

In today's picture, you can see how she is tilted to her right side...so we're no longer supposed to put her in this lounger because it just promotes the bad posture for her neck. Bummer.


But how cute is her piglet outfit?!?!