No Helmet and Very Pleased With Results

[Guest guest]

My daughter, now 10 1/2 mos old, was diagnosed w/ positional plagiocephaly and

torticollis at the age of 2 mos. At first, it was a battle with doctor after

doctor to take my daughter's condition seriously. Time after time, we were told

that she will be fine and just grow out of it. My husband and I were very

skeptical as I have a cousin who's son went through the same thing. Finally, we

were referred by our family doc to a specialist at Children's Hospital in

Columbus, Ohio. He was wonderful. He explained that she may or may not improve

without the use of a helmet, but that we should be open minded about her

treatment. At home, we worked diligently to reposition her off the flat side of

her head, improve her torticollis by doing twice daily stretching exercises and

to also increase the amount of tummy time that she had. Needless to say, the

child was never of the back of her head. Let me tell you, it was not easy at

first, but then it became the norm and that's just how it was. As she grew, her

head did change. Her ear alignment, at first, was not affected. But within a few

months, it was horrible. I became very worried that our conservative methods

were no longer going to work. We visited Children's once again and her doc was

very pleased with her progress and explained to us that the head grows in stages

and that this was part of the growing and changing that she is going through.

" It will look worse before it gets better... " is what we were told. I left that

appointment very upset and convinced that we needed to pursue a casting for a

helmet. My husband, on the other hand, wanted to wait and see....it was killing

me. But, still I continued her stretching exercises, and by this time, she was

playing on her belly and sleeping on her belly 100% of the time. A few months

passed and just recently, we visited Children's again. At this point, I was very

enthusiastic about the improvement that my daughter's head had made. Her ears

were just about even again and the flat spot and ridge on the back of head were

nearly gone. Her doc was thoroughly impressed as well. That was almost a month

ago, and I can still see improvement even from then. I know that her head will

never be " perfect " . But my husband and I are very proud of our decision not to

band our daughter. It was a lot of work, but well worth it. I am not saying that

I am anti-helmet, as I feel that each child is different and each case is

different. But for us, we were fortunate enough not to have to do that. I have

pics posted for January (1 month after diagnosed), March (4 months after

diagnosed), and August (9 months after diagnosed).

I want to say thank you to this group for all of the wonderful information that

I obtained from others that have been through banding and not. It really helped

me through knowing that my daughter was not a " freak " and that everything would

be okay.

, Ohio