..to try this for my daughter..Help

[Fryib]

hello,

quick background -
I have two children, son aged 3.3 and daughter aged 15 months.
my DD has always been difficult. Very clingy, wingy, easily upset. To the point she will cry if a stranger says hello or looks at her.

Two of my close friends have second children who are the same age as her (within wks) and they dont behave like this.
Even if i go to walk out of the living room to the kitchen she starts cring, and gets sooo upset.

Im a SAHM so she doesnt get left with anyone else exept me and DP (possibley relevent?)

A friend at a stay and play mentioned today that she has used a cranial osteopath on her sons and it seemed to calm them and she claims they became more content, happy etc (the wonder cure?!!

So AIBU in considering booking her in for a session, (at £22.00 I might add,) to try and help her. Or is this just a huge rip off, and she will eventually become less stressy and upset all the time when shes ready?

maybe i just need to keep repeating "this is just a phase......."

Thanks

I also know people who've used it for children and adults to good effect - if it works for £22 what's not to like?

I would certainly try it.

YANBU to give it a try and £22 is a reasonable cost for it, but there is no guarantee it will provide you with a miracle cure! She might just be like that. Your friend who used it on her DSs might have seen improvements for entirely different reasons.

I have used it on DS and it improved his situation enormously - but it was for different things entirely. I don't know that I would be trying it for what appear to be character issues.

thats what made me a bit sceptical, it may well just be her personality.

My friend said it helped one of her sons with sleep and eating, hes almost 3, and was a terible sleeper.

thankyou for your replys. x

My dd2 was a bit like this and we had real issues when I returned to work when she was about 10 months old.

We felt the best thing for us/her was as far as possible to accept that she preferred to being with us. We count ourselves very lucky that we found the most wonderful cm (after having a terrible start at nursery, it was just too busy and too many staff for her). The cm only had her and another little boy and they developed a beautiful close relationship.

In other circumstances we just "went with it" where possible. My own parents were accepting of the fact that she wouldn't always go to/with them. Ils got put out at times. Also we didn't leave her in creches etc e.g. at church. There were one or two friends she would go to when she got her confidence.

From about 2.5 years she has gradually got more confident and less "clingy" and has settled into her preschool sessions. You may also find that as she gets older she will take comfort in the fact that her big brother will often be with her even if you or your dp aren't. :)

We tried it early on for DD who was a screamy baby (spent 22 hours out of every 24 crying). That improved.

However, she's always been clingy and still is. At 18mo she's finally becoming less clingy, but I still can't leave her except with DH

Can you use it on older babies?
My DD is 17 months and a terrible sleeper she cries all the time and hardly eats.
I would try anything.

It can be tried with any children, although my osteopath said it takes longer to make changes the older the children get. A good osteopath will tell you at the first appointment a) if they think it's worth continuing and b) how many sessions they think they will need. It shouldn't be a 'keep coming until we decide to stop', there should be an end in sight! With DD we had 3 sessions altogether.

you can use it on any age, CWWM. give it a go, might help. Sounds terrible, btw

one other question,

how does the man/woman who does the treatment actually do it?
In the sence that my daughter will obviously be screamung/crying at a stranger, especially one touching her! do i hold her or is she on a bed?

thankyou x

I used it for DS when he was 3 months old and very poor sleeper, seemed very unconfortable.

He had a difficult birth (shoulders got stuck, came out blue etc) and cranial osteopath thought that may have caused him to feel cramped up and unconfortable so stopping him getting proper sleep.

After first session he slept for 12 hours straight after only ever sleeping for an hour at a time before. Then steadily improved each session. Had about 10 sessions I think. Became a great sleeper (10 hours a night straight, settled straight away)by age of 1. Now a lovely even tempered 8yo.

But he was not clingy (difficult to tell at such an early age) just cranky and difficult to settle.

I am sure it would work on similar problems with older babies too. In fact osteopath said bring him back in the future if he had similar problems right up to school age, but he never did.

So it may work for you CWWM.

Fry - cranial osteopathy is very gentle and I am sure you could hold your DD while it is done if that is what is necessary to keep her calm.

Fryib - the Cranial osteopath will have a massage table/couch to work on - I used to keep my hands on DS on the couch to stop him moving, and she would do what she needed to. It's very gentle treatment indeed, no big movements.

I really think it is worth a try, DS had terrible wind from birth, always getting stuck, was small and a week early and I was in tears about how tired I was and my inability to do anything. He always looked cramped up with his legs tightly against him. A friend suggested it, I thought it was well worth a try! After the first session he was able to be winded more easily and she pointed out some things to me, didn't even get to his head! Have had 4 sessions and it is the best money spent. I am sure he would have grown into what he does now but he clears his own wind easily is much happier and content and is a completely different length as he now lies straight instead of curled. Amazing and I know there is more they can do for people (I suffer with bad colds and blocked ears and my osteo taught me how to relieve it, honestly they can do wonders for all sorts of things - my dad is going to help him recover from his stroke and my mum for tinnitus!

oh, that interesting u mentioned tinitus. My Dp suffers badly from it, and has always be told by his doctor thats its just something he has to live with. Honestly it drives him nuts sometimes, hes gets really distressed.

I will ask when i book DD in. U have convinced me its worth a try, especially as the guy comes well recommended by friend.

Thanks everyone x

Spookily, DS had that cramped up posture as well, that was what prompted HV to recommend cranial osteo.

Osteo treatments might help her relax and feel a bit more confident, if its innate shyness or just a phase.

Could an osteo come to your house so she wont be frightened that some weird person wants to touch her head in some weird room?

They definately helped - though did't cure - my DS's colic/ reflux.

If it helps, osteo's could possibly cure all sorts but they aren't allowed to say so! If you think about it they have been around for several thousands of years so there must be something to it.

It is well worth it to try on your dh's tinitus, I don't know if it will help with your dd but a friend takes her ds to one at the beginning of each school year if he has changed class. He was quite sick as a little boy and she knows it helps him even if it just a placebo effect!

Also to point out my osteo has never tried to make me go to more sessions than necessary, we saw her 1 x per week for 3 weeks, then 1 x 2 weeks post and now we are going in another 2 weeks for last appointment. You would have thought I had a different child!

I have heard people rave about it. My personal POV is that it is an unproven crock of shit.

Some really clingy children don't seem to improve until 2 1/2 or 3.

My baby sister would not stay for one second with even Daddy or her sisters.

Not one second, she would scream and screeeaaammmm in apparent real terror.

At 3 she suddenly stopped and went off to play at a neighbour's house every day.

The therapy sounds interesting though, and worth a try.

more likely to be 'stranger danger'

back when we lived in caves, a stranger, partic a man, represented danger to the tribe* and this manifests itself in modern human babies with fear of people, crying (to warn the carer of a possible interloper, to scare off predators too) and clingyness

this will pass, as experience teaches the child that the vast majority of strangers are benign

• my non-scientific theory

I held DD for 2 sessions - didn't need to put her on the couch. In fact, the 3rd session she was in her pram (carry-cot type) and he said rather than disturb her more than necessary, he'd leave her in there! He was very tuned in to her, and one time said she'd had enough after 20 mins, so spent the last 10 mins on my husband's back!

Our osteopath is great - uses the same techniques on baby elephants in Kenya who have had a traumatic birth experience!

Faamily - I thought it was a crock of shit until desperation (and a very screamy baby) led me to try it.
The osteopath actually told me things about my very stressful pregnancy, that I had forgotten to tell her about.
We went back when ds was diagnosed with severe glue ear at 6 mo. The dr's told us there was nothing they could do until he was older. After 3 sessions with the osteopath, ds went from being almost totally deaf to being within an acceptable level of hearing.

Don't knock it until you've tried it! :)

If it's any help or reassurance dd, also the youngest of two, was a clingy, whingy cry baby. Until she was at least three she was never happy it seemed unless part of her was touching part of me. It became less and less once she started nursery and in spite of all my worries she never looked back when starting school. She's still a quiet girl and quite shy too but she's also very calm and very self reliant. Bear with it and let her be herself - she may surprise you but I do remember it being very very hard at the time.

onceaami that sounds exactly like our dd2 :) (just turned 3)

Even now, if she is tired or a bit off, she wants to be holding my hand (preferably in bed next to me from 6am when the "rabbit clock" wakes up)

She is ok with dh but if I am here she wants me. Her favourite position is sofa/bed holding my hand and his hand!

As you say the clingy stage is very very hard at the time. I am glad we ignored well-meaning nosey people who wanted us to toughen her up. She needed to let go in her own time.

Spookily - osteopathy by that name has not been around for 1000s of years, unlike other complementary therapies. It was started in the late 19th Century, as was chiropractic.

"unproven crock of shit" - ha. Try telling that to all the people it has helped.