Back to physical therapy

Truman had a recent physical therapy evaluation. With his history, he has periodic PT evals and has been in and out of PT all his life. Unlike other forms of therapy (at least in Truman's case), PT is more short-term goal based. You set the goal, once you reach it, therapy ends until a new need presents itself. We had requested the most recent eval because he just seems awkward in comparison to his peers. Knowing his oral palsy issues and his past palsy issues in other parts of the body (remember the upside crawling he tried as a baby), we try to be hyper-vigilant about such things. Apparently, we were right.

Based on the results of his eval, his therapy clinic is recommending two sessions of PT a week to work on the following: (1) failure to run properly; (2) failure to jump properly; (3) improper floor sitting (apparently sitting with your feet behind you in a W formation is very bad for your physical development); and (4) core trunk strength. Presumably, a lot of things he does "awkwardly" or "improperly" are a result of overall muscle weakness, so things that might not seem like that big of a deal in other kids (like being behind in jumping) can be pretty significant to a kid with low muscle tone. At the least, it's something that needs to be addressed because it causes other problems.

So, that means that every week Truman will have two speech therapy sessions; one occupational therapy session; and two physical therapy sessions. And every two to three weeks, he will also have an hour-long feeding therapy session. Add to that three hours of special ed pre-school every day. This is one busy kid.

I really wish we could let him be a typical 3-year-old in some sort of Mother's Day Out program for a couple of mornings a week with the rest of his time to run and play and take trips to the park. As it is, his life basically consists of getting up, having breakfast and getting ready for school, school, therapy, lunch, nap, playtime with Mama in the evenings, bath, then bed ... every single weekday. At least, he seems to have lots of fun at school and therapy.