Tag: Anat Baniel Method

Learning to Move with ABM Lessons

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Over the past 2 years, I’ve referenced ABM lessons a number of times without going into detail about what this is and how we came across it. So, finally, after much success with ABM, I sat down and wrote this post about how we began with the Anat Baniel Method.

Have you ever sat and watched an infant’s body learn? It seems as every part of them moves at all hours of the day, twisting and turning, exploring, learning where their body is in space. These movements are repeated thousands of times, helping to build the muscles necessary for sitting up, crawling, walking, jumping, all gross and fine motor skills that are typically developed. When the brain is damaged in infancy, the body skips out on many of these movements, causing developmental delays like what we’ve seen with Solly.

When Solly was an infant, I think I always knew he wasn’t moving as much as a typical baby, but it never struck me how few of those subtle, brain-building movements he was making until Bea came along.

In the Fall of 2016, I was poking around the Internet, looking for new therapy ideas and resources because Solly was stuck in a rut. One year prior, I’d been so excited to move to Nashville and gain access to a new team of doctors and therapists to help Solly continue to thrive, but over the year, I felt like our gains grew smaller and smaller. Solly was hitting a plateau. I was growing concerned that this was it – there were no more gains to be made. (A crazy thought considering Solly was just two years old!)

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Lately: On Specialists and Therapies

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The other day, a neuromotor researcher asked me to send her a list of all the therapies we are doing as well as the specialists we regularly see.  With all the traveling we did and changes Solly went through in the last year, this seemingly simple request was not so simple! After our year of change, in my mind, we really pared down the number of therapies Solly did each week, but our schedule is still pretty full. The biggest difference is that we have more therapies that are fun for Sol and fewer that require him to sit still in a chair.

After racking my brain, here is the list that I sent her:

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The Right Kind of Support

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Before I had Solly in my life, social media was a place to simply share photos, articles, humblebrag, and occasionally whine. Back then, even though I was working in digital marketing, I felt myself growing increasingly annoyed with all the oversharing on all platforms and was particularly ready to pull the plug on Facebook (hello, addiction!).

Then, I had a special needs child. Because of HIPPA, our doctors and therapists couldn’t connect me with other parents going through a similar journey. I connected with a few parents while in waiting rooms, but their child’s diagnosis wasn’t always the same, so I still had questions and craved advice from parents who had been there, done that. So, I started googling and realized how many special needs parents were making those kinds of connections on social media – mostly, Facebook, but also Instagram and Twitter. Over the past three years, I’ve started one support group and have followed and participated in several others. These groups not only help me discover new therapies, new medical treatments, and doctors that can help Solly, but they also give me a place to vent and share wins with people who go through similar ups and downs every day. Plus, I’ve even gotten to meet several local parents who I’ve since met up with in person! (These meet ups are refreshing – it’s always like reconnecting with a long-lost friend.)

A daily walk in the shoes of a special needs parent is certainly not an easy one. But I’ve found that with the right support group, life has gotten a little less scary and, in most cases, I’ve even felt empowered when making decisions for Solly.

If you’re new to a cerebral palsy or stroke diagnosis, or you’re simply looking for help with some of the alternative therapies, here’s a list of my go-to support groups on Facebook:

General

KISS Pediatric Stroke Support (I started this support group with two other stroke Mamas so we could not only connect parents with one another and share experiences, but so we could also follow what non-profits were doing to advance pediatric stroke awareness. We’ve grown to over 1,000 members and have parents from all over the world.)
Mom’s of Pediatric Stroke Survivors (If you’re local to the middle Tennessee area, be sure to join this one. It’s based in Nashville and gives lots of good resources on local therapies and doctors, plus the Mama who started it puts together a meet up every few months.)
CP Warriors, Mommies, Daddies, Grandparents, and Caregivers
2014 Cerebral Palsy Babies Support

Medical & Alternative Procedures

SPML – Selective Percutaneous Myofascial Lengthening
HBOT for Pediatric Neurological Conditions
Parents for HBOT
Stem Cell Therapy for Cerebral Palsy and Brain Injury (Parents Information)
Pediatric Cannabis for CP & Other NeuroMuscular Disorders
Pediatric Cannabis Therapy
Anat Baniel Method Parents/Caregivers

Know of any others I should add to the list? Feel free to send them my way!

As I mentioned above, I’ve also met some parents and gotten great info on other social media platforms. I’ll do my best to put together a post with my favorites, so if Facebook isn’t your thing, stay tuned!

Solly and Bea

Another type of support often seen in our house: sister helping brother!

A Coffee Date

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Two little rascals

You know what happens when you have two babies under the age of 3? You drink all the coffee and don’t sleep a whole heck of a lot, let alone write blog posts.

I have had so much to say – so much has happened over the past couple of months – but at the end of the day once both babies are in bed, I struggle to get the words out of my head. Instead I usually let my brain ooze while I watch the Bachelorette and drink a glass of wine, promising myself that I will write that blog post tomorrow.

So, friends, grab your coffee (I’m already on my second cup while en route to a therapy appointment), and let’s have a coffee date – I’ll catch you up!

  • On May 24th, Solly and I completed our first round of hyperbaric oxygen therapy with our final, 40th dive. I found our entire experience of HBOT to be so positive and, most importantly, Solly had so many gains. You can read about experience with HBOT here and here.
  • The next day, we packed up our lives in South Carolina and – with the help of Nana and Papa – Solly, Bea, and I flew back to Nashville while Mike drove home with Solly’s equipment and our pups. Given all of Solly’s gains with speech during HBOT, our two short flights were wild with Solly laughs and squeals. You know when you fly, there is always that one child who is screaming during the entire flight? Yep. That was Solly! And, boy, are we sure happy that he’s that kid now!

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    Nana and a wild Solly on the airplane

  • Just one short week later, Mike and I packed up the babies once again and flew to Summit, New Jersey, where Solly had a consultation and surgery with Dr. Nuzzo. This one is hard to summarize, so I’m putting a separate post together to cover our experience. (Don’t worry. Even though it’s about the scary, seven letter “S” word, it ends on a positive note.)
  • Back home in Nashville, Solly participated in a weekend of Anat Baniel Method intensive lessons. We loved seeing some of our friends there – and even met some new ones – and, of course, spending time with our ABM practitioners Jan and Mary.

It’s been a whirlwind two months, but thankfully we are staying put in Nashville for awhile. We’re getting Solly set up in new therapies, reconnecting with some of his old (pre-HBOT) therapists, and ramping up for some intensive therapies to help make the most out of some of the gains we saw from HBOT and Solly’s new, looser legs.

Off I go to a new feeding therapy evaluation with Solly where I will likely fill up my coffee cup one more time. Life these days requires quite a bit of caffeine, but Solly and Bea sure make it all worth it!