Helmet Hair.

Mr. M & I have a new word in our vocabulary, and Little Mister is sporting a new accessory.

The word is plagiocephaly. There's a big technical definition I could quote you, but in plain English, it basically means that Little Mister's head isn't symmetrical. Since birth, he's had a flat spot on the back of his head from his breech intrauterine positioning. (His head was wedged up under my ribs, and it didn't allow his head to fully round out.)

For months now, the doctor has been keeping a careful eye on it, and even though it's rounded out quite a bit from where it started, the progress just wasn't complete enough. Two weeks ago, we went in for a neurological consult, and the specialist agreed--Little Mister would need to wear a special cranial molding helmet.

The helmet doesn't "push" his head into shape using force. Rather, it applies static pressure to the areas of his head that are already filled out, which encourages growth toward to the areas that need to fill out--i.e., the flat spot.

Given that his plagiocephaly is only moderate, he should only have to wear the helmet for three to five months. This first week is (thankfully) the gradual "getting used to the helmet" week, where he only wears it an hour or two at a time, with the sessions getting incrementally longer each day. At the end of the week, he'll begin wearing it 23 hours a day. We're hoping he'll be out of it before his first birthday, but if not--no biggie. We're just taking it a day at a time.

Of course we're kind of biased, but we think he looks pretty cute in his new helmet--helmet hair and all.