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| Oh, mother. Who cares if my butt is always black? I's adorable when I's scootz! |
At 15 months, Elodie doesn't walk. Or pull-up on her own. In fact, she struggles to get into a sitting position. She lies flat on her back--like a turtle--and yells until an adult helps her sit up. From there she butt scoots around until someone grabs her hands and pulls her to standing/walking.
Just call me The Puppet Master.
I've been worried about her lack of movement for months. The butt-scooting thing means she's always sitting Indian style (or crisscross applesauce - the pansy way of saying it) so when she tries to pull-up, her legs and feet are all tangled up. For a while she refused to straighten her legs when I'd dangle her above the carpet--she'd rather scream in floating Yogi position--and I was terrified there was something wrong with her legs. The doctor frowned and wrote a referral to a developmental pediatric.
Then! She tolerated standing! She took wobbling steps! She high stepped around the doctor and muttered baby insults at him! He tossed the referral and diagnosed her as STUBBORN.
Great. Another one.
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| Elizabeth at 13 months. She was walking--and giving me attitude--and growing MAD hair?!? Wow. Elodie does not have flippy curls. Sorry. Just noticed that. |
Elodie demands that I hunch over and walk her around the house--or else she'll scoot around behind me, moaning and reaching for my pants. (Cooking dinner is awesome, let me tell you.) She's bored with scooting, frustrated that she can't pull up on crossed feet, and screams to be put down on the dirty public floors where she scoots and...gag...I can't even talk about the yuck that sticks to her pants...
But she's FAST! If she wants something, she is scooting like mad, practically jumping up and down on her butt, flying across bare floors and squealing in delight. She just won't stand up and WALK.
All the other babies in the nursery are walking. The little neighbor girl who is 2 months younger took her first wobbling steps last weekend. And then there's Elodie...just butt scooting along.
She'd find a whole new world (and stop moaning out of boredom) if she'd just pull up and give it a shot.
Maybe she'll be walking by fall? Christmas?!?
11 comments:
The stage where they want to move everywhere but can't walk yet has to be THE worst. It was a constant struggle in public bc she always wanted down but..I wasn't about to let her crawl around Target lol.
I'm not sure a developmental pedi was exactly the right doctor to see..I personally would have wanted a referral to a PT for an eval and possibly an orthopedist depending on what PT says.
I know you are laid back (my god I admire that) so I guess you could give it until 18 months but thats my advice on who to see next if you are still worried.
I can tell that you want her to walk SO bad and it would make her & your life a lot easier. Hopefully she will get the hang of it soon!
I know this really isn't that funny, but it made me laugh. I feel your pain. My youngest didn't walk until she was like 16 months old. I worried about a developmental delay. Luckily, she just had her own plan.
She too was a scooter. Except she looked just like Golum on Lord of the Rings the way she got around. We even started calling her "my precious".
I think my daughter's delay in walking was in part due to an older sister who was pretty much always in her face. She didn't need to get to a toy when her sister was right there to hand it to her.
The good news: Elodie will walk when she is ready, just like my Rachel did.
My kid shit his pants until he was 4........
...the walking thing is nothing.
my daughter wouldn't crawl on her knees at 13 months. We got her evaluated by the early childhood network through our school system. They have a vested interest in helping kids EARLY in life (so it's not plop--now you're in kindergarten and you just now are diagnosed. Anyway, keep it in mind if you continue to be concerned. We get free (paid through taxes) therapy treatments in home. Mostly they just show me and my daycare things we can do to strength my daughters legs and encourage her to do more. It has been great!
That picture of Elizabeth cracked me up! LOL. Elodie... wow... I am glad nothing's wrong but sad you're having to deal with miss stubborn! Hopefully she will be walking soon! :)
She will walk when she damn well ready and not a moment sooner.
And I totally feel you on this one, Jake was my last kid to talk. All his siblings were flying around and he just sat there.
He's 4 now and doesn't stop.
I agree with the others - she'll walk when she's ready. They have their own time table. If it's really worrying you - give yourself a deadline and if she's not walking by then call a specialist.
My 18 month old son just started walking 2 weeks ago so I totally know where you are coming from. Fastest crawler around...but didn't want to walk. Now he is a walking pro...and he DOESN'T want you to hold his hand. lol
I hate baby milestones. I hate baby comparisons. I hate parents who talk about percentiles or any other assessment of their baby, good or bad. I had a neighbor who would stress out about her 3 year old wearing 2T sizes and many others who would get so concerned over every kind of development you could imagine.
I also had (repeat, HAD) friends who believed that their huge toddler or chatterbox 2 year old were somehow THEIR accomplishments and would laugh about how their child did this and that.
ALL of them made me want to slip them a roofie and write "fart" on their foreheads (like Buford on the wall in Raising Arizona).
I hate any of these things that might make a parent feel unnecessarily worried or anxious.
When I used to get worried or concerned about one of my children's development, I'd ask myself if I'd be worried if it were just us, with no other families to compare us. It always always stopped my worries immediately. And things turned out just perfectly.
About Elodie: She's perfect.
If she's scooting on the floor, that's exactly where she should be, dirty booty and all.
If it were one of mine, knowing me, I'd probably put some candy on a table or something to see if that would be too tempting to not stand up to get to it, but if that didn't work, I'd smile, continue to know they are perfect and right where they should be and enjoy the fact that I didn't have to worry yet about first-walker-head-injuries.
Don't get me wrong. I'm THANKFUL for therapists of all kinds for the children they help when they need it.....but honestly, most of the time I want to take a clipboard and smack everybody with it when it comes to this stuff.
Parents have enough to worry about. Let the children do things on their own time!
Give Elodie and hug, kiss and a sweet dirty little booty squeeze from me ;D
(by the way, your babies are SO cute) :)
my daughter who is 4 1/2 now didn't walk or talk till 22 mos and from 18 mos and on was filled with specialist after specialist, today you can hardly tell she was so globally developmentally delayed, Her early intervention teacher told me that Ms Thing will do it when she is good and ready
When my sister was this age, she walked everywhere on her knees. I can't imagine what her pant legs must have looked like.
Good thing she is CUTE!
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