newbie - our story & a few questions

July 3, 2010

I'm new to the group. It's nice to know we're not alone in our journey. Tyler

will be 12 mos Jul 11. Our pediatrician noticed his plagio at his 2 month appt.

We repositioned and saw some results. She referred us to a pediatric

neurosurgeon who told us not to worry about it - that his was mild. He also

told us that Tyler had torticollis, but we didn't believe him because his neck

tilt wasn't severe like we had seen in some internet pictures. But we did get

even more aggressive with positioning and saw more results.

Finally, I realized he did have tort and took him to PT. He was in PT 2x a week

for almost two months, then 1x a week for a few more months. All told, about

5.5 months of PT.

In mid-Feb, we went to another pediatric neurosurgeon for another opinion, since

we didn't care much for the first guy. But we got pretty much the same

message... " He will grow out of it, but we can't guarantee it and we can't say

when. " They also said, " You don't hear about kindergartners with

plagiocephaly. " So, we left the appt deciding that we weren't going to pursue

the helmet (although we did ask him for a written scrip for one before we left

(just in case)). :-)

Well now he is one year old and I can still see that it's there. I know its

mild. You can't really tell from the front. However, when I look at him in the

mirror, I can see that something about his face is slightly " off. " He has a

" protrusion " on the back of his head on the left side and above his left ear a

bit. His ears are also misaligned slightly.

We have our evaluation with CT on Fri, Jul 9 at Paramus, NJ. We'll see whether

he's a candidate for the helmet and whether they think he will grow out of it if

we do nothing. I'm concerned though that he won't grow out of it and I will

feel guilty if I didn't do all I could for him when I had the chance.

I've been seeing that some people post cephalic index numbers and other such

numbers. Will CT give us those numbers for Tyler at his appt?

Also, I was thinking in general about brain & head growth. I know that the

companies tell you that at 2 yrs they can't help you anymore since brain growth

is pretty much complete by 2 yrs. But think about the size of the head of a 2

yr old and the size of the head of an adult. Clearly, an adult's head is

bigger. So obviously the skull is still growing after 2 yrs. Doesn't it stand

to reason that change can still happen after 2 yrs? Does anyone know anything

more scientific about this?

Anyway, I've rambled on long enough. Thanks for " listening. "

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