Friday, March 09, 2007

Confident Cruisin' and Ball Therapy

While she's still not strong enough to take free steps out into the open, my daughter continues to gain confidence and balance while cruising furniture. Lately, my wife reports that she is pulling up against the outer side of the bath tub in our master bathroom and then reaching up and cruising along the counter top so that she can stretch up on her toes and see herself in the mirror. That's reaching pretty high up for her. Good thing she loves the mirror so much

She's also cruising along the end tables in our living room and stealing stuff off the kitchen table. I can't believe how good she's gotten about standing up. In fact she's even starting to try and stand in the middle of a room.

A lot of this new confidence is coming from some new therapy my wife has been using. She bought a two foot diameter children's ball. Then she stands our daughter up next to it and lets her hold on. Our daughter has to stand without any help and in the mean time, Mom is slowly moving the ball around. This requires her to learn to balance and take steps without actually holding on to any stationary objects. This little girl is even getting good enough now that my wife can completely let go of the ball and my daughter will maintain her balance and keep standing all on her own. She's really coming along. It's cheap to get a ball and doesn't take much effort to do the work, and it's a therapy that we've had great success with.

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