Lorna the Therapist

So the last 6 months have been the most difficult 6 months in my life.  I had a baby girl Piper who was born prematurely and that has defined everything I have been doing for the last 6 months.  I am still now starting to find out if there is anything else I can handle doing anything besides mother her right now.  I have been on a project at work now for 2 weeks which with the holiday has meant a total of 5 days away from the Piper. I am blessed with the flexibility to work from home two days a week. By the end of the day yesterday all I wanted all I needed "was to hold my baby".  When I say I think the United States should have State funded 1 year paid maternity leave I mean it not from a political stance.  But from the stance of a mother that desparately yearns to hold my baby when she is away from me.  It is viceral not a political idea.

Today unfortunatly was not all giggles and spit up though.  Today was a Physical Therapy day, which is presumably why I am working from home in the first place to do all the hands on appointments for Piper.   The Ocupational Therapist  is named Lorna. I would just refer to her as "the therapist" but my mother in law always refers to her by name which feels a bit strange and almost too personal.  She does come to my home and does a service for my family but I don't know that I would call her Lorna if I went to her at an office somewhere.

So anyway Lorna the Therapist really made Piper scream today.  Apparently Piper's torticollis is getting worse.  So we need to "be more agressive with her neck stretches".  Early on when Lorna the Therapist noticed that Piper had a slight issue with torticollis she threatened us with these "horrible stretches" which is now where we are.  Today she threatened us with a collar made of tubing, which BTW she had in the car.  But she didn't want to use it if we could make the stretches work.  Ugh I feel like I am at the dentist when the therapist comes over.  Every week it is a new issue and a new horrible painful thing that could happen if I do not follow Lorna the Therapist's recommondations.

There was mentions of working on her overstimulation issues and her tolorance of crowds.  But that is not important right now right now we have the "take care of the neck".  I was instructed to get on the floor with Piper and hold her neck to the right. "How long?" I ask. "To tolorance" translation until she screams to the point that you can't tolorate it anymore. I think it is supposed to be until she can't tolorate it but to me that would be as soon as she screams.  When Lorna the Therapist had me administer the exercise she had me do it until I couldn't take the screaming anymore.  In addition to this stretch we are supposed to do the one that Piper really hates which is holding down on her right shoulder and pushing her head straight But Lorna the Therapist didn't write that one on the list.  Piper was so "done" by this point that Lorna the Therapist did not have me administer that one.

Lorna the Therapist wrote the following instructions in Piper's notebook:

On tummy - turn head to the right  - hold- lay next to her and talk [while she screams in your face]

On tummy - double roll to increase angle and look for head up arms forward and straight is fine. [because we tried to get her to do something with her arms but she wont so go ahead and focus on the head]

Roll side -> Back->Side [because she refuses to be on her belly so let's not even go there right now]