So a year has passed since Kellyn was first diagnosed with torticollis. I mentioned previously that her PT was pleased with her improvement and gave us the OK to stop doing her torticollis exercises at home. However, I'm still not entirely satisfied with Kellyn's head positioning. I notice that she has a habit of
slightly tilting her head on a regular basis. In addition, I have noticed her restarting her bad habit of curving her body into a c-shape. For the amount of time and energy poured into her treatment, I would have thought her head tilt and trunk curvature would have been entirely eliminated. Therefore, I decided to start doing her torticollis exercises with her again. I dedicate about ten minutes each morning to her exercises. Now that she's a very active and mobile toddler, its a lot more difficult to get her to cooperate with the exercises. I basically get her distracted with TV and run through our little torticollis exercise routine.
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| This slight right tilt is Kellyn's normal. It's obviously very mild, but enough for me to notice. |
After a couple weeks of restarting her exercises, I wasn't noticing any improvement. Part of me just wanted to throw in the towel and say, 'this is as good as it gets.' But I can't comfortably do that without exhausting all possible options. I decided it was time to go back to the chiropractor for another round of treatments. I really liked Kellyn's previous chiropractor, but it was a bit of a drive from our house. Since time is of the essense for us these days, I decided to take her a local one. So today, I took Kellyn to a highly recommended chiropractor that is only five minutes away. At the beginning of her appointment, the chiropractor conducted a rolling thermal scan on her back. This is a quick and painless scan that is designed to detect areas of nerve compression. Now that we have a the baseline scan results, we can objectively measure her progress throughout treatment.
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| If you look closely, you can see her slightly tilting to her right. |
After the thermal scan, the chiropractor adjusted Kellyn using the activator method. During her treatment, she peacefully laid on her tummy without moving. Kellyn must have been really relaxed because she left behind a pile of drool. We decided to take to her once a week for the recommended six weeks. Then, we will have her rescanned after the six sessions to see if there is a noticeable difference. In addition, I will compare before and after pictures to see if I notice a visible improvement in her head tilt and trunk curvature. I'm really hoping that adding chiropractic back in will be the final piece of the torticollis treatment puzzle. I'm so ready to say goodbye to her torticollis for good.
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| Again, another shot of her ever-so-slight head tilt to her right. |
