Torticollis...and the rest of the story.

For those of you who don't know, Kate has had a condition known as Torticollis (also known as 'wryneck') since birth. It's simple really -- probably something she developed from being cramped so tight in mommy's tummy and from being carried so low for so long. It causes her neck to pull to one side (to her left). So if you've noticed in her pictures (much like the one above with her Grammy and Grandpa), in almost all shots she pretty strongly favors that left side. We've been visiting physical therapy since she was about 3 weeks old to try to correct the problem, and were told by PT that the problem would probably have resolved by now. Unfortunately we are still working to fix the problem, doing her daily stretches and turns to try to get the muscle to where it should be. It's been a frustrating thing for Joe and I, really, as we had hoped she would have been straight by now (no pun intended). But we constantly try to remind ourselves how truly blessed we are that we have a beautiful, healthy baby, torticollis or not, and that if this is the worst of our problems, then we're doing pretty darn good. So at last week's PT visit (we've been going on a weekly basis for the past couple weeks) she informed us that Kate really had failed to make the progress she had hoped for, and recommended that we get an Xray or possibly check into a vision problem that could be causing her to favor one side. So with that, I went home and scheduled an appointment with the pediatric orthopedist we had seen when Kate was 10 weeks old. We visited him then to get her hips checked out -- apparently one fun aspect that can accompany torticollis is hip dysplasia. He assured us at that visit that her hips were perfectly fine and there was essentially no need to worry - we would come back at around 6 months of age and do an Xray to be sure her hips were ok, and that her torticollis should resolve on its own with time, particularly once she begins to hold her head up and sit and stand on her own. Kind of a different story than what we were getting from PT. So we went this morning for that follow-up appointment with the peds orthopedist where we had an Xray (after waiting in the doctor's office for over an hour with a VERY tired Kate who was also slowly getting closer and closer to feeding time). He examined Kate --much to her dismay; don't think I have ever heard my baby scream quite like that, not even during shots-- and once again assured us that she seems to be fine, and reinforced the importance of Joe and I pressing on with her exercises. In the next 6 months we should see tremendous progress. So with that, we'll continue doing her daily exercises and PT visits until we start to see some progress and kick this torticollis thing to the curb. Now from what I've read and what we've been told this seems to be a pretty benign and even common condition in babies, but I've learned that when something ----ANYTHING---is wrong regarding my own baby, it can, at times, seem like the most debilitating, hugely over-exaggerated illness overcoming her little body which thus fuels some crazy mommy urge in me to correct the problem at all costs. But then I come back down to earth and remind myself of the precious, PRECIOUS gift from God of having a beautiful, otherwise healthy and thriving little girl, who just so happens to lean to the left a little bit :)