All this rolling is very good for Sam because it means he will probably spend less time on his back and hopefully will give up his preference for looking to the left. Big sister Harper made her self comfy during the pregnancy which left little room for baby brother. We noticed Sam's head shape looked somewhat off shortly after birth, but figured he had been through a lot and babies heads aren't always so perfect immediately after arrival. During his hospital stay the nurse started noticing his head shape as well as a preference for turning his head to his left side. We've been diligent about providing lots of tummy time and worked on enticing him to look towards the right since he's been home. Despite all of this, his head shape has worsened and he has a fairly noticeable flat area on his left side along with some facial asymmetry. Our pediatrician sent us to a craniofacial surgeon at one of the Children's hospitals here in the cities. He confirmed that Sam has torticollis as well as deformational plagiocephaly. The torticollis means that the muscles in his neck are very tight on one side and the plagiocephaly means he has a flat area on one side of his head. The surgeon feels both the torticollis and plagiocephaly are on the severe end of the spectrum. The remedy is some physical therapy to work on stretching his neck and a small helmet called a cranio cap. He will need to wear the helmet 23 hours/day for 3-5 months. We'll go in and have it adjusted every week or two. Both torticollis and plagiocephaly are more common in babies born early as well as in multiples. Sam was also growth restricted during the pregnancy, so these issues probably started in utero. I really dislike the idea of him having to wear the helmet and hope he tolerates it ok, but in the grand scheme of things it really is such a minor issue. Bennie already has big plans to decorate it for Sam!
And, so as not to let little brother steal the show, Harper decided TODAY was her day to start rolling! She wasn't going to let her twin get too far ahead of her! It's funny because yesterday when Sam started rolling I remember thinking that Harper probably would not for at least a few more weeks because she just wasn't showing that much indication of doing so. Well this afternoon I had both babies on their play mat while we were working on dinner and out of nowhere Chris asked me if Harper just rolled over. I turned around and sure enough she was laying on her stomach, happy as a clam. I rolled her on her back (mostly because she was on a thin play pad on the wood floor and I didn't want her to face plant!), well it wasn't more than a few seconds and she rolled right back over on to her tummy! She did it over and over again, showing off her new trick!
It was so fun watching Ben take it all in, he was so cute, saying "I'm so proud of you Harper, you're such a big girl!" and "I'm so proud of you, Sam, you are such a big guy!" It won't be long and these two will be chasing to keep up with their big brother!
Posted with Blogsy
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