Spawn has wheels!!!!!

Last week at PT, Spawn started using a walker.   I cried a lot.  I've been waiting for him to have independent upright mobility since he was 12 months old - and he's now almost three - so freedom has been a long time coming.

We've previously tried to interest him in one.  His facial expression was "You know that walkers are the first step in feeding children to wolves? Right?  What kind of a wolf feeding program are you running here?  I'm onto your game, lady!"

If I haven't been clear, Spawn is one of those kids who needs to accept an idea on his own time frame.

I can understand that; I remember when I spent weeks arguing with a young PT about my belief that walking on my toes 24-7 put me at an advantage if I ever went into ballet.  I was five and had seen about 5 minutes of "The Nutcracker" on TV months before.   My mom eventually told the PT that this was NOT a hill to die on; I wasn't using my newfound understanding of ballet to get out of PT.  I just wanted to share information.   So....Spawn's clearly my son.

Two weeks ago, he saw a little boy using a walker when we were waiting for his speech appointment after PT. Spawn was fascinated.   I asked him if he wanted to try a walker.   He said "YES!" very clearly - and he's in that phase where his favorite and most common word is "no".   I left a note with the receptionists to tell his PT in case I forgot - and the rest is history.

Seeing how proud Spawn was of being able to walk with a walker made me so very happy - and proud.   He is a walker champ!  He knows how to walk forward and shift weight backwards to free a wheel when it's caught.  He's a natural problem-solver so he figured out immediately how to slide his walker sideways to move around an obstacle.  And that's after less than 20 minutes of walker time with a PT!   (I come from a long line of crazily proud parents; it's genetic :-) )

His NICU PT happened to be over in the outpatient building and got to see a baby she knew as a 1 pound 12 oz snippet cruising the halls like he was all that and a bag of chips.  We gave each other hugs and cried.

Spawn's PT started the paperwork to get a walker paid for by insurance.  Spawn has a diagnosis of hypotonic cerebral palsy - so that helps greatly - but it will take weeks to months for everything to move through the process.   I wasn't thrilled about that - but I had two backup plans.

Plan B: Spawn's special education team mentioned months ago that the county probably had one we could borrow.   Spawn had an IEP testing time that same day - and three appointments a day with a toddler is hellish - so I brought up the idea with his point person.   She said she'd bring it up with his care team - but he's transitioning between the county-level and district-level of care - so that kind of leaves him in a weird no-man's land.   I was not surprised by this response both because I've worked in education before and because I've been less than thrilled with the county level of infant education but I was still disappointed and more than a little annoyed.    My annoyance, though, was mitigated because I still had Plan C.

Plan C: The DIY retailer I work at had a motivational pamphlet describing lots of charitable things done at the store level.  One of the stories was about parents who came to the plumbing department with a list of items.   The associate asked them what they were doing and they said they were building a walker for their preschooler based on a video they found online since they weren't sure if insurance would cover a walker.   The associate let the store manager know about the project - and the store manager told the parents to go out to dinner while the store team members built it for them.

My takeaway from this was that you can find plans for DIY walkers online - and that the US's private medical insurance system sucks.

It took me 5 minutes to find the video followed by 20 minutes to find all the right parts on my store's website and order them.   My dad has a chop saw, helped measure Spawn and helped me glue all the pieces together.  My mom gave me lots of hugs.

We had a functioning walker for Spawn in two days.

The weather was windy today but over 50 degrees.   Since winter is setting in quickly this year, I decided today was a great day to do a paint job on his walker since the white PVC highlighted the printed batch information, UPCs and escaped PVC glue extant on the tubes.   I had high-gloss candy apple red spray paint that I used on the body and satin gloss teal spray paint for the white portions of the wheel. 

 He loves it - and so do I.