17 month old not walking

[somuchtolearnabout]

Hi everyone,

My son is 17 months and still isn't walking. He crawled late at 11 months but has been pulling to stand / cruising since 11 months, but he still won't let go. He has been seen by a physio and is hyper mobile also has low muscle tone which would explain some of it, and she gave me a few exercises but was very much "he'll do it when he's ready" - which I know he will. But this is very new territory for me as all my other children were walking before their first birthday.

Does anyone have any tips to help encourage baby to walk? He will let go (unwillingly) and can stand unaided.....but doesn't like to. If he's not paying attention and just playing he sometimes let's go and can stand for a good few seconds but if he's holding my hand and I let go, he slowly lowers himself to the floor.

I think the issue is confidence. Any tips?

Thank you!

Well, it's not quite the conventional advice but with our DS we suspected it was just confidence so we help out chocolate and he let go and walked a few steps for it.

@somuchtolearnabout hello! I know this thread is a few months old now but I was just wondering how your DS is getting on? We're having the same issue with our DD. She's 17 months and just will not walk! She has been causing since about 9/10months, and crawled relatively early. I think we naively thought she'd walk fairly quickly! She sounds identical to your DS - very reluctant to let go of our hands, seems very nervous and doesn't really stand unless she hasn't realised we've let go of her hands. If you've any words of wisdom or advice they'd be much appreciated! Thanks!

Hiya! Well he actually walked about a week after I posted this thankfully and he's running about everywhere now. One random thing which did help was that I started standing him up with me holding onto his thighs so he felt like I was helping stabilise him, but he wasn't holding my hands. I would then let go of his thighs and he could stand independently - so he was clearly capable he just didn't have the confidence to do it alone. This was the first time he had ever stood independently without holding anything with his hands. I did that one morning and carried on doing it all throughout that day, so every time he was crawling I'd go up to him, stand him up and hold onto both thighs until he was stable, then I'd let go and let him stand on his own. The next morning he walked. So I can only imagine that must've helped somehow because he finally realised he could do it on his own. Lots of standing practice was what helped us, then the next morning my mum stood him up and let go and he walked across the entire room to me. He clearly could've done it much sooner he just needed a little push. Suffice to say I'm no expert but it's worth a shot! Good luck, I know how infuriating it can be - as much as people say "they'll walk when they're ready" it doesn't stop you worrying!

@somuchtolearnabout that's a great tip! Thanks so much, I'll definitely be trying that now! I feel like she's been so close for months now - I know what you mean, we've had a lot of comments from family & friends along the lines of "she's STILL not walking?? You must be getting worried by now" which is only adding to our anxiety!! I'll definitely be trying that tip so thank you!