Many of our close friends and family members know our Addie Girl is a late walker. Next month brings a new year and along with it, her second birthday.

Addie may not take those elusive first steps before then, or even stand unassisted before then. However this does not diminish the many leaps and bounds she has made over the last 6 months—Tim and I are so, so proud of her.

Let me back up to July of this year, when we first received confirmation from Addie’s doctors that she has gross motor developmental delays. (Gross motor basically refers to more “physical” skills that require a lot of work from large or core-stabilizing muscles for things like walking, running, climbing, etc.) The word “delayed” is concerning for any parent to hear, but there is a lot to unpack within that word, and many things that it cannot tell you. For example, it cannot indicate why your child is on their own trajectory. It cannot give you a diagnosis or insight into a treatment plan. It can’t even indicate transience or permanence.

What that word will do for many parents, Tim and myself included, is transform them into an advocate for their child. July was the beginning of a marked change in how we conduct our lives, which is now scheduled around doctor visits, exercises, and physical therapy appointments, all of which Addie needs for her development.

I will try to explain what we’ve learned about Addie in the simplest way I can, but it’s not entirely simple, so bear with me.

Addie is not on a typical timeline for gross motor development. She learned to crawl rather late (around 13 months), and could only army crawl (i.e., crawling with her tummy touching the floor) until she was about 16 months. She has not yet learned how to stand unsupported or walk unassisted. She has hypotonia, which means she has low muscle tone.

She has to work a lot harder to do what most of us would consider basic tasks, such as squatting, pulling, standing, pushing, and kneeling—basically all of things kids need to master to get around independently. Additionally, her hypotonia makes her ankles pronate, which means that her ankles roll inward due to her ligaments being extra lax. This then naturally causes her body weight to shift, so she often only bears weight on the inner flat part of her feet. Because of this, she needs to wear orthotic ankle braces to give her the stability she needs when being active and to create a more organic arch for her feet.

Despite all of this, she has learned how to do so many things, and has gotten markedly stronger since beginning PT! Some milestones we consider to be of most significance for her are:

-Standing upright without needing to rest her core against anything

-Knee walking/walking on her knees

-Pushing carts/toys

-Taking steps while holding our hands

-Transitioning to a standing position from kneeling

-Doing a controlled sit from standing

-Crawling up and down stairs

Though we do not know yet when she will walk independently or what walking might look like for her, Tim and I are confident that Addie will take those first steps. We have just learned to understand and appreciate that she is setting her own pace and her own timeline when it comes to her development. But if there is one thing we do know after the last six months of physical therapy, it is that our daughter is capable of hard things, that she is strong beyond measure, and that her sweet disposition is not easily swayed by challenges. Milestones may look a little different for us, but we celebrate them all the same.

We do not know if Addie’s hypotonia is congenital (i.e., something she was just born with) or if it is a symptom of a bigger diagnosis. Next month we are undergoing testing with her neurologist, however we are not guaranteed any answers from those tests. We will need to wait and see.

This entire experience has been a practice in getting comfortable in the unknown—something I have never been good at. We take things one day at a time. We celebrate our girl’s many, many accomplishments, the big and the small. We listen to the advice of her medical support team. We practice being patient. We do the best we can, understanding that the best we can do looks different every day. And we remain grateful for the support of family and friends along the way.