United Brachial Plexus Network, Inc.

Hi, my 8 month old daughter has a brachial plexus injury to her left shoulder, she was injured during delivery. My concern is that she is not crawling at all, and she sits up ok if I help her into a sitting position but she will not sit up on her own. she will lay on the floor and hold her head up like she is trying to do a sit up but that is as far as she gets. I know that she has no muscle tone in her left bicepe(sp?) She is going to have surgery on Nov. 14 th at children's hospital in Milwaukee. Has anyone else's kids with BP injury done the same as her? or did they crawl and sit up on their own just fine? right now she rolls everywhere that she want's to go. she is in therapy has been since she was about 2 weeks old. I'm a concerned mother and would like to know if this has happen to anyone else?
thanks,
Bonnie

My son never crawled..he is a Global LOBPI. He pushed himself to the sitting position when he was about 10 months old..and then within a week started scooting and at 11 months old started cruising. He is 2 1/2 and still has never crawled.

I never crawled I was told.

Carolyn J
Adult LOPBI/69

Lots of our bpi kids don't crawl. Juliana scooted. And she was fast! When she was around three she learned to crawl as a part of therapy. It wasn't until then that she could do it. She walked at around 13 months (I think).

claudia

Brandon NEVER crawled.....he just scooted on his bottom.....as he got older, he tried hard to "ARMY CRAWL" but never, ever used his affected arm. He also didn't walk till he was 15 1/2 months old, I don't think it harmed him at all, and no matter what we did, he would not crawl so we kind of gave up !
GAYLE

I had a very interesting conversation with one of Maia's therapists this morning. What we talked about is basically that our children have been through traumatic births and with traumatic births there may be neurologic issues (caused by the trauma of the birth)outside of the BPI. BPI is an outcome of someone mishandling one of the emergencies (shoulder dystocia) but what about oxygen depravation + ? She recommended that the children be fully assessed for their whole bodies - not just their arms. This type of evaluation is called a neuro-psych eval.

Maia did have a neuro-psych eval early on but they were still very tunnel vision during the evaluation. No one did anything that came close to a PT evaluation of gross motor skills. They checked her eyes, sight, ears and hearing and that was it.

Maia had to learn how to do everything - NOTHING came naturally to her. She had to learn how to sit up - how to crawl - how to stand up - how to walk and we spent years and years learning how to jump and how to do steps. None of that had anything to do with her arm.

So my suggestion for new mommies is to really get your kids checked out so that they can get the services they may need and diagnoses outside of the bpi. Don't allow tunnel vision. If your child has to learn how to do everything and it's a slow process then there's obviously more going on.

Maia's stats:
Sitting Up: 9 months after 2 months of PT
Walking: 22 months (still in PT)
Jumping: 3 1/2 years old (with PT)
Stairs: just was able to do alternating feet last year! (years of PT) (she's age 9) but she can only do this on good (strong) days

I posted under the other question, but I figured I would put it here, too.

Hi, My daughter never crawled. She always scooted on her behind until she learned to walk. Her therapists and doctors said not to worry about it. EXCEPT...it is important that her affected arm receive weight-bearing exercise. Maybe your therapists already do so, and hopefully you do at home. Obviously, crawling would give her weight-bearing without the therapy, but that just wasn't possible for my daughter, and it seems not for yours either. If you are confident that your doctors and therapists are capable in the treatment of her injury, then I would not worry about what milestones your daughter misses/does not accomplish at all. Most of us with children who are past the infant stage can testify that our worries about whether our children would turn out "normal" proved to be unfounded. In fact, many of them have completely passed our expectations. I'm sure yours will too. Good luck!

Amy, Lexi's mom ROBPI, 5 happy years old

As you can read from previous posts not many bpi children crawl. My mother told me I never crawled either. At the age of 9 months I must have been frustrated enough and just started walking.

I was very pigeon toed when I was born so I wonder at times how it was I ever even walked.

Unfortunately it seems like the norm for the BPI children not to crawl. I know it's frustrating but don't worry about it to much. Your child will eventually walk and it will turn out just fine.

My son didn't crawl until he was almost three. He scooted instead of crawling. Then he walked! Then he crawled! It is normal for a child with a BPI to not crawl.

Blessings,
Kristie

Hello Bonnie! I just wanted to tell you a couple things First is Abbie never really crawled. She scooted starting about 10 months old. Second~Abbie had a nerve Graft done in March and I was in a big panic about what I was going to put her in to keep her warm that would fit around that brace (she was 9 months old when she had her surgery) but a friend of mine made these things that I could just set Abbie in and zip up so she could wear something to bed and I wouldn't have to put anything over her legs. They worked great!! If you'd like email me your address and I will send them to you! They helped a lot! I cut a hole in 2 of them so I could get the car seat straps between her legs but I think I have like 3 others that don't have that slit in them! If you want them let me know!! Good Luck with everything! Blessings to You and Yours!
Amy & Family
luv4fairies@cablemo.net