Part 1
Holding head and torso without effort!
What is robustness?
It is the ‘spontaneous’ capacity to hold one’s head up and trunk straight in a vertical position.
When I say ‘spontaneous’, I mean that this ability cannot be attained through training, it has to be embedded into your child’s structure. You have certainly observed your child’s strenuous efforts to attain these achievements, which look more like an Olympic accomplishment rather than normal motor functions.
Why is it so difficult for your child to lift the head or sit ‘up’?
Simply because the very canvas embedded in each of us, ensuring proper and spontaneous support, is dramatically weakened in a child with cerebral palsy. Asking your child to ‘hold’ a position, while his/her canvas is not reinforced, goes back to attempting to get a rag doll to stand upright.
Your child bravely appeals to their skeletal muscles to attempt to ‘lift off’, but these muscles aren’t designed to accomplish that function and require lots of energy to activate (just think how tired your muscles get when you lift weights at the gym!)
Weight-bearing should not require any effort!
When our fascias have proper tone, they insure a hydraulic capacity within our bodies that allows us to hold spontaneously hold a specific position.
The problem, in children with cerebral palsy, is that these tissues are weakened and hydraulic capacity is consequently lessened. However, the good news is that fascias can be strengthened through specific and easy to learn techniques.
No more strenuous effort, no more unattainable goals, no more disappointments.
Strengthened fascia creates an improved hydraulic capacity inside your child’s neck and torso, improving the spontaneous and real support of their structure.
Next time, I will be covering the second set of developmental conditions that are realistically attainable:
Vitality and vigor vs vulnerability and fragility
You won’t want to miss it!