DS2 (3y2m) is the slowest-moving child on the face of the planet. He bimbles along at a pace that would bore a snail. Partly, he likes to marvel at the wonders of nature - collecting leaves, stones, berries etc while humming tunelessly to himself, but his pace when he isn’t handing me his latest finds is still sloth-like. As a result, I’m concerned I’m getting in a slightly self-perpetuating cycle of non-walking - if I really need to be somewhere, he doesn’t get to walk at all, and goes straight into the pram or the sling (which doesn’t bother his lazy little arse one bit). Or he’ll get to walk a tiny bit, then get bundled up, as often as not because his dynamo, completely opposite, 5yo brother has shot off out of sight. I’ll often give DS1 to DH to supervise and I’ll stay with DS2 - today we went to our local park like this. DH/DS1 took 8 minutes to get there on bike/foot. DS2 and I took THIRTY FIVE MINUTES on foot. DS2 wasn’t even remotely fatigued after this - he carried on slowly to the playground and around the park - so I don’t think there’s anything pathological going on. Just a lack of oomph. He’s similarly inactive in a swimming pool - just likes to hang there, smiling prettily, humming, pulling daft faces, and generally ignoring any requests to expend any energy to propel himself.
I’ve tried getting a sense of competition into him, or getting him to chase me - ‘Oh, DS1’s going to beat you to the park! See if you can get there first!’ or ‘Eek! It’s a monster called DS2 and he’s chasing me!’ (There’s probably a local madwoman alert out with my photo on it.) He’ll look at me disdainfully and say, ‘It’s not a race, mummy.’ And carry on at his own pace. We were out running around a huge open field with DS1 a few weeks ago to see if that would light a fire under him. I deliberately got a long way away from him to see if it would make him nervous enough to speed up. I shouted for him and he gave me this knowing grin then, I shit you not, started walking backwards away from me incorporating these jazzy arm moves and a bum-wiggle just to drive the point home.
Don’t bother suggesting a balance bike or a scooter - he has both, and by some miracle of physics manages to achieve about half his walking pace on each, then gets bored after about 10 agonising minutes of inch-wise progress, so I end up carrying those as well.
I’m seriously thinking of rigging up a hat that suspends a bag of chocolate buttons just out of his reach to see if it spurs him into action.
Any better ideas??