Walk It Out

What in the heck does the title of my post means? Well, it's a desperate plea to my son to START WALKING. Some of you are probably scratching your heads and doing the math on your fingers....YES, he is 15 months old and not walking. Refusing to even think about walking...or standing. Just as an extra boost, Max's pediatrician got us involved with a great organization called First Steps about two months ago. First Steps is an early intervention organization for kids from birth to age three for a multitude of different things. Anyway, we got hooked up with a great physical therapist, who evaluated Max and determined that he had low muscle tone in his ankles and core area (stomach/abs) - therefore, not making it easy for him to support himself to walk. There is no reason for these, no physical or mental abnormality....I guess it just happens. She comes out once a week for an hour and works with him....which he does okay with for about, oh, ten minutes. For the past two weeks, this lady has left my house smiling telling me he'll be walking by the time she comes next week. Guess what....big surprise, both times she was WRONG. At Max's 15 month check up today, I mentioned my frustrations and worries to the doctor on Max's lack of ambition to walk. The doctor observed him and told me he is not concerned....he feels that it is more a "stubbor" thing than an ability thing. He claimed that about 10% of babies Max's age don't walk yet. We are in the lucky 10%, as I continue to lug my 27 lbs. toddler around and feel my back completely breaking from doing so. We have been working day and night with Max to try to encourage him to walk....and I am DREAMING of the day he just stands up and does it. I never dreamed I'd have a toddler that refused to walk! Putting everything in perspective though, I'll take this "health" issue with my child any day over the more serious health issues other parents have to deal with for their children. Therefore, I'm not complaining....I'm simply writing a plea to Max to please get his booty off the floor and WALK to mama :) Let's hope I can post an extremely excited post on here soon about Max running around the house!