Aquatic Therapy

We started Jacob in physical therapy at around 2 1/2 months. This is when they first noticed that he was very hypertonic. He was originally assessed for regular physical therapy at Akron Children's Hospital but he did not tolerate it well. He would scream and squirm if anyone ever touched him to stretch him out. The therapist there recommended aquatic therapy. In the first session Jacob tolerated about 25 minutes in the water. By the third appointment he was able to tolerate the entire 45 minute session. He really loved the water! His therapist, Miss B, was also very good with him and he made a lot of progress with her. We continued to take him there each week for the next eight weeks. The 45 minute drive there was becoming a pain with him screaming in the car and it also become a lot carting Dominic back and forth with us. It took nearly 3 hours for us to complete a 45 minute therapy session by the time we drove there and back, and completed his therapy. Along with all the other appointments and home visits throughout the week we felt this was too much on our family. We inquired about an aquatic pool for therapy closer to home. We came to find out that there was one five minutes from our house!

We began therapy with Jacob at the new place about three weeks ago. We hated to move him from Akron Children's because he was doing so well. Also at Akron they deal solely with babies and children. The place by our house is a regular physical therapy facility and they never worked with a baby in the pool before. After the first week Shawn and I really had to weigh the pros and cons of changing locations because we felt he may not make as much progress with the new therapist. We decided to stick with the new therapy facility by our home because it took an hour to get there and back, along with therapy. Also one of us could actually stay home and play with Dominic. The new therapist is not as experienced and seemed a bit uneasy at first handling him in the water. Let's just say we had to tell her a few times that his head was going underwater while she was working with him, whoops! He will be going into his fourth week now and I'm glad we have stuck with this place. He is becoming more comfortable with her and is starting to progress well there. It has taken some stress off of our family, and with Dominic, which I am happy to see.

We have been working on Jacob gaining more strength in his upper body. Although he has high tone, he still is unable to hold his head up on his own and push up on his arms when laying on his stomach. He cannot roll all the way over due to his arms. Jacob also cannot grab any toys as he keeps his hands fisted most of the time. Over this past week we have seen him open his hands more and seems a little more relaxed, which is a nice change. We have been told that he most likely will never walk so we are hoping he can gain control over his upper body so he can move a little in his wheelchair. For us any progress is good progress for Jacob!

Also, one real nice perk is they allow me to go in the pool and do my own work out while Jacob is receiving therapy. I have been struggling trying to find time to work out so this is a win win! So as of right now Jacob receives aquatic therapy twice a week and in-home therapy once a week. Our hope is that all of this early intervention will increase some functionality for him later in life.