Leg Braces for Cooper

Cooper has toe walked since around age 2 we think. We of course were especially concerned at first as it's a flag often seen for autism and being told he had a 1 in chance of having ASD, were already on pins and needles. Luckily there never was a connection between the two for him and he is considered "typical". After lots of online research and talking to his pediatrician, going to see a neurologist, blood work, it was determined he is not doing it for a medical reason and would hopefully stop as most kids do. By age 4 it became apparent Cooper was not going to stop on his own. On top of that, his tendons had gotten so tight it's now hard for him to even walk flat if he wanted too. Are his tendons tight because he has toe walked for so long or does he toe walk because they've always been tight? We'll never know. We did physical therapy last year but had to stop due to insurance issues. This fall we pursued it again and after getting his tendons looser, we were still unsuccessful in getting him to walk flat without reminding and then it doesn't last but minutes. He pops right back up.

So, now we've come to leg braces. We went to get them yesterday and I just feel so bad he has to wear these. I am trying to remind myself that other kids have to endure much worse challenges, including his brother, but as you can see, it's hard to say it doesn't suck to some degree. I have regretted not putting Cooper in K this year (fall b-day, so we red shirted him) and am happy about the decision now, so he wouldn't have to deal with these at school. I am also glad we got this going in the winter and not the hot summer months. On top of wearing these braces, he has to wear them with shoes all the time and we had to go get size 4XW's for them to fit inside!!! He's 5 and is typically in a 1W. We are really just hoping these do the trick because the next steps are much more invasive and include casting and possible surgery.

We are starting out at 2-3 hours a day for the first week and are to build up from there. As of right now I don't think I'll be sending him to preschool in the braces, it's just to much right now, but we shall see.