Our sweet little gem. She has the softest cry, even when shes super mad. She has been through so much for her 6 months. I can go through her amazing birth story another day. At 4 weeks old she started to break out. My babies had never had baby acne, and always had great skin post birth, this was quite new for me. At first, I thought, oh just that baby acne the little ones can get. But it would come on so quickly! And it worsened, and worsened, and it started to bleed, and sort of puss. It was horrible, and worst of all, it was all over her poor little cheeks and face. I could take away most of the redness with breastmilk. After each feed I would just soak ever spot that I could find in milk. And it helped! But it didnt fix it, I decided I should get her looked at, maybe she had an allergy to something in my milk. The doctor said it was eczema. But if it was an allergy to food, she would have it on her body as well. So I treated it as I was told. Still no improvement, worse even. So I went back to only breastmilk treatment and shed the creams and ointments. Then I started rewashing everything in new detergent. To shorten this up, a few days without the cozy in her carseat and her favorite blanket, along with a chat with a friend at church, led me to believe it was a contact allergy, and I had narrowed it to polyester. We still keep polyester away from her and don't allow it to touch her. The eczema cleared up!
At 6 weeks old she was breathing very rapidly and had a mild fever and cold. After some advising from the on call pediatrician I found myself in the ER with her at 11 pm on a Monday night. Everything came back clear, thank the Lord. 2 weeks later at about 8 weeks old, she still wasn't over the cold. She was coughing and had such awful congestion it was making her vomit. I tried to not get super concerned but after 2 days of some scaryness I decided I needed to get her checked out and went to urgent care. She was admitted to the hospital. I watched in horror as they tried and tried again to IV her and even blew veins. So terrible on such a little thing. But she got the treatment she needed. Their concern was that it was pertussis. I never heard back if it was but for the hospital stay they diagnosed it as bronchiolitis, scary in such a little one, and treated her as if she had pertussis as well (they actually send the sample out of hospital to be tested so it takes awhile). We came home but it still took a week for her to be much better!
Fast forward to today. Ruby has a head tilt. I had noticed and did minor things to try and correct her preference. She has quite the noggin', in the 98% as far as size. I would tilt her head straight or try to get her to look the other way. Set her down for tummy time, or sit her up-she sits unsupported now. But to no avail no improvement in the past month. Then over the weekend, I noticed her eyes. One looks more open then the other, and one ear, it sticks out more. What was a mild concern for her preference turned to major concern. It was obvious to me, maybe to no one else, but as her Mama I could see, this preference was becoming a problem. Its called a torticollis.
You can see the tilt to her right side, and also if you look closely, her right eye looks more widely open then her left, which looks like it has a bigger eyelid. And her left ear seems to be sticking out.
It can happen because of positioning in the womb, or maybe it has happened to Ruby because she has such a big head, and such a small body. Either way, it has tightened and strengthened the muscles on one side of her neck and weakened the ones of the opposite side. Imagine trying to stretch your calf muscle, every time I try to turn Ruby's head the non-preferred direction, shes uncomfortable. With the torticollis, comes the problems with her head. Keeping her head in a preferred position and direction results in a head that is not correctly shaped. Its called plagiocephaly, or brachycephaly, depending on how you look at it.
She keeps her head 99% of the time tilted to her right shoulder. We have it caught in good time that there should be no lasting muscle effects, but she will be getting physical therapy to help get the muscles worked. The shape of her head and how it is off-setting her features is also of concern .To correct this secondary issue caused by the torticollis she will be in need of cranial band. AKA. helmet. To say I am not looking forward to the 3-5 months, 23 hours a day of helmet may be an understatement. But, I have faith the Lord knows my sweet Rue better then I and He knit her together just so right down to her inner most being.
From the front, the usual head tilt. You also can see the mild left ear sticking out.
This is not a direct above shot so it doesn't quite show the protrusion of the left side and flatness of the right very well. But you can note the overall flatness of the back of her head, almost creating a square look, this is the brachycephaly.
