How severe is this plagiocephaly?

[SteeplechaseEva]

DD is 3 and a half months old. We have tried the usual things. Not sure whether to start looking at helmets etc

A friends child just grew out of it around 6 months....is it the side they lie on?

She lays completely flat on the back of her head. Unfortunately she was born with a slightly flat back of the head so has always lay like that, making it much worse. We reposition her when sleeping and 2 minutes later she is facing straight up again! Which is odd really as the shape isn't straight across the back anymore...

My son's is worse than that and my midwife said it will be okay as it will round out when he sits up etc. Apparently there's not proper evidence that helmets actually work anyway.

My son (now 12) had quite pronounced plagiocephaly but from about 2, you couldn't notice it at all. I wouldn't worry.

My son looked like this, but it all popped out into a symmetrical shape by the time he was about 18 months.

My dd's was worse than that, it sorted itself out by the time she was about a year old.

My daughter's cousin had a head like Kryton from Red Dwarf but he's a handsome teenager now. It happens. I'm sure your baby is absolutely adorable (hard to tell from that angle but I bet there's a gorgeous baby face). Try not to worry about it.

My daughter started to get exactly that, flattening on one side. I bought a certain pillow and insisted she uses it whenever lying down, cot, pram even in the BM bouncy chair. It stopped it getting any worse but it didn't improve. She's now 2.5 and it's barely noticeable under her hair and now she's bigger but I am still aware and it's clearly visible she has wet hair.

Link: www.theraline.co.uk/babypillow.htm

No idea where random BM came from in my above post! Sorry.

Just wanted to add... I wouldn't try to ignore it and assume it's will correct itself. My dd and at least 2 older children I know never corrected the shape. Luckily with my dd I acted and prevented it getting worse. If I have any more dc I will use the pillow at the very first hint of it happening again.

Thank you, this is reassuring. I know this sounds really dumb, but which side should she be sleeping on? Like I said she sleeps facing completely straight up, and the worse bit is the actual back of her head... Though her head is asymmetrical... So should we be encouraging left or right? I will look into those pillows too thank you.

It’s very common, will correct as they grow - it may not get completely symmetrical but once they have thicker hair you won’t notice. Both mine had it, the youngest has gone completely, my eldest had it really badly and he’s now 4 - slight asymmetry but you wouldn’t notice unless you were looking for it.

Please don’t put a pillow in your baby’s cot - it goes against all safe sleeping guidance.

There is no evidence for helmets either.

My daughters was very similar. It rounded out a bit but once her hair grew you couldn't tell anyway. She's 6 now and the back of her head is still a bit flat but it's nothing that's caused any issues

Once lockdown is lifted maybe look into cranial work with a chiropractor. It's done wonders for my son's head shape. I started when he was 6 months old and you wouldn't know now (just turned 2) that he'd had a flat spot at all

I thought that at that age they were supposed to sleep flat on their backs. My dd would stay on her back but turn her head a bit so the flat part was down and getting worse. I would adjust her head but she'd always revert to the turned position. Only the pillow kept her straight

To clarify- the pillow I'm talking about is a specific one designed for this exact situation- not just any standard pillow. It's made of springy mesh and is mostly holes. I crammed it as hard as I could over my own mouth and nose to test it, and could breathe completely freely.

Can you have her have her naps in a sling for a while so she is upright and only flat on her back at night?

My daughter's was far worse, I was so worried about it! We took her to a chiropractor as she seemed unable to turn her head to one side properly which led to her always lying on the other side. The chiropractor loosened her up but her head remained flat for a good while. It just seemed to round out gradually and now at the age of 13 you would never know she'd had a flat head at all!

I echo the suggestion to see a cranial osteopath.

Slightly different situation, but might be useful to you anyway. when my daughter was tiny she would only ever turn her head one way and really hated being breastfed lying on one side. We had a difficult birth and her head was quite misshapen when she was born.

I took her to a cranial osteopath at about six weeks old and the following day she was turning her head to look both ways and feeding easily. The osteopath said her muscles down one side of her head and neck were really tight and causing this.

From memory (this was about 4years ago) I paid about £20/session (about 20-30min) and I think we went two or three times. This was West Mids area.

My oldest had a pretty flat head. I bought a small heart shaped pillow for playmat etc, a sleep curve mattress for his crib and I did a couple of cranial osteopath appointments. He had a stiff neck from a forceps birth which I didn't notice at first.
All helped and he's now a normal looking 3 year old!

My advice would be to ignore it, certainly don't start messing around with helmets .

My DS looked similar at that age, it just evened itself out.

@SteeplechaseEva, my DD also has plagio (2 months old). I hope you don't mind me asking if you have noticed any changes to your DD shape over the months?

Please any update

My DS developed this early on due to torticollis, when we brought it up to HV we were told it's common and he'll grow out of it (he didn't). As he was born in the middle of the pandemic we didn't want to take him to unnecessary appointments, I always found this site comforting though with everyone sharing stories and some pictures. He's 2 years old now and I still find it very noticeable but others don't unless I point it out. I'll share some pictures with his hair wet so you can really see it. Currently he's a happy, healthy little boy and hopefully stays that way. I'll try to update periodically but I will say be proactive about it if you notice early on.