Jackson's Torticollis

I have been thinking about writing this post for a while, but never really had the chance to sit down and put all of my thoughts into words. I wanted to write these things out so that we can remember them, but also because I am hoping it will help another parent when they hear the words:

 “Your baby has something called congenital muscular torticollis.”

Let me back up to the beginning…

Before Jackson was born, he spent a lot of time in the birth canal during my labor, and had been head down for many weeks before I delivered him at 39 weeks. Sometime during that period of time when he was head down, or even another time in utero, his little body got cramped because of the lack of room and caused his right ear to touch his right shoulder. We aren’t sure how long he spent in this position, but it was long enough for the neck muscles on the side in which he was tilting to shorten and tighten up.

After he was born, we could immediately tell that he looked like he had had a little bit of a rough time coming out. Nothing serious, and I think it is very typical for babies’ faces to be swollen, especially their eyelids, after they go through the whole delivery process. My poor little boy was swollen and puffy, and when he opened his eyes it was barely a squint. After a few hours, the swelling started to subside, but he remained swollen for at least a week after birth. Because of all the swelling and just his newborn squishiness in general, we didn’t notice his head tilted to his right side much at all.

It wasn’t until the next week when I was home with him that I noticed he always turned his face to the left. When I was burping him on my shoulder, he turned his head to the left. When he was lying on his tummy sleeping on the couch, his head faced toward the left. As a new mom you are warned of the importance of turning your baby’s head from side to side so that they don’t develop flat spots on their soft impressionable skulls, so I tried to physically turn his head to the right a few times. I couldn’t. It felt like if I kept trying to turn it, I would pull his little muscle, or I would even break something. There was a resistance when I tried to move his head, and he started to fuss the more I tried. It really worried me, but I assumed that he just preferred the left side and that with time he would move to the right as well.

Here are some pictures of Jackson from a few days old through two months. Notice how his head is always tilted toward his right shoulder and when on his tummy or back, he faces to the left. It looked better or worse depending on how he was sitting and how much support we gave to him. 

At his two-week check-up at the pediatrician’s office, his doctor examined him and chatted with us for a while. She did most of the exam while Jax lied on Matt’s lap, but when she took him into her arms to look more closely, she pointed out that she noticed his head tilt. “Does he always tilt to his right?” she asked. We replied that yes, we felt like he did. She put him on his belly on the exam table, and he immediately put his head facing the left. She too tried to lift his head and turn it, but couldn’t get him to move. She smiled and gently suggested that this can be common and to try for the next few weeks to put toys on his right side, talk to him from that side, and even lie him in on the floor where he might try to look at the television on his right. She said that sometimes repositioning like this is all that babies need to stretch their neck muscles when they show a preference for one side or the other. She also told us that it was important that we worked with him because sometimes if an infant always tilts and faces to one side, it can cause some facial deformities in the muscles in their cheeks and face.  She also advised us that if he didn’t show improvement at two months, she wanted him to start seeing a physical therapist.

Physical therapy? For my newborn? I couldn’t imagine what that would be like or look like. I was determined to do all I could to keep Jackson out of physical therapy. 

I began working and repositioning Jackson everyday, but even after two months of us trying to reposition him, he wasn’t showing signs of improvement.

I then did what any 21^st century mom does: I googled {don’t you love that that is a verb?!} I started reading about a fairly common condition called congenital muscular torticollis, and the more I read, the more I realized that this was what Jackson had. I didn’t need his pediatrician diagnosing it. I just knew it. He fit all the symptoms and physical characteristics. Head tilt from birth, face to one side, refusal to turn to the other side, and a slowly developing flat spot on his skull where his head always tilted. I had never heard of this condition before, but it apparently was a common diagnosis and most babies needed physical therapy to correct it.

At Jackson’s two-month check-up, his pediatrician took one look at him trying to hold his head up and how it continued to tilt to the side and said that she was going to refer him to a pediatric physical therapist to correct his torticollis.

I knew it, I thought.

I immediately asked the pediatrician if she thought this was something serious or if we should be concerned. She said that no, we shouldn’t be too concerned, but the best thing was to get into physical therapy early and to be consistent with the stretches they would show us. She once again reminded us that there can be some facial deformities if his muscles on one side of his face were worked more than the other, so that’s why she was pushing us into therapy so early on. I was thankful for how proactive she was being and called the physical therapist’s number that she gave us the next day. 

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I'll be back soon with our physical therapy experience!