Reality

Long story short: we have an appointment this afternoon for Burton's sweet little head to be cast for a "cranial remolding orthosis." A helmet. To fix his sadly misshapen noggin. I am decidedly not excited about it.

Burton seemed to have a preference for turning his head to the left as soon as he was born. We would put him down for a nap and turn his head the other way only to have him immediately turn it back to the left. Try as we might, we couldn't get him to turn it to the right on his own with much success. I just thought he was stubborn :) He especially hated tummy time. By the time we went to his two month pediatrician appointment we were really concerned because he was developing quite a flat spot. At that time we found out he had torticollis - basically the muscles on one side of his neck were tight and the other side were weak so he turned and tilted his head in a specific direction as a result. Torticollis is often a result of position in the womb and/or a traumatizing birth. Burton was dealing with both.

We went to physical therapy for three months and did lots of work at home to stretch and strengthen Burton's neck muscles and position his head and the torticollis greatly improved. Unfortunately, Burton grew really fast (like babies do) so the work we were doing to help him turn his head the other way couldn't keep up with the flattening. Also, once a baby has even a little bit of a flat spot, there is a tendancy to lay on it more, increasing the flatness. Burton is a big baby (He's going to be tall like his Daddy hopefully!) so his head grew especially fast in the wrong direction. The first month of physical therapy was really difficult for me. Burton was improving quickly but I was a major stress case. I worried about which way his head was turned every minute he was laying on his back. By five months old we had seen a little improvement in Burton's head shape but not enough to rule out helmet therapy so we decided to go ahead with a helmet. Note: helmets aren't even considered for babies under five months old. (I guess I included an abbreviated version of the long story afterall...)

In the end I'm not worried about Burton. I know the helmet will help fix the problem and everyone we've talked to says that babies adjust to the helmet quickly and it's not painful. The helmet doesn't squeeze or pull like braces for teeth do, it's a mold for the head to grow into. No, I'm not worried about Burton, I'm worried about me.

Never have I felt as inadequate, out of sorts, and unconfident as I have as a mother (at times). A challenge to be sure. I worry what people at the grocery store will think of me as a mother when they see Burton's helmet. Will they think I never hold him? I worry that people who know me will change their opinion. Why do I care? I take being Burton's mom pretty seriously. Greg goes to a full-time job to provide for our family and I'm at home taking care of Burton as my full-time job. I guess I take criticism as poor job performance. What could I have done differently to prevent this from happening? I feel like I should have known in my mother heart what I needed to do earlier. Maybe this whole experience is simply meant to teach me some humility (something I've often lacked). It boils down to this: I don't want people to think I'm a bad mom and I'm just feeling selfish.   

I'm not looking for a pity party. I just need to be honest with myself about what I'm feeling.

Greg is so sweet about this whole situation. He claims to be really excited about Burton's helmet. He talks about how we can decorate it or what Burton can be for Halloween. I think he's legitimately excited to an extent but I know he's trying to help me not be so sad/upset. As my Dad would say, "He's  good boy."

Here's to no more triangle headedness!