Hypermobility

Since Orla started walking, we've noticed (and various people have pointed out to us) that she appears to walk in on her feet. The effect is so pronounced on her left foot in particular, that it looks as though she is almost walking on her ankle bone. I took her to the GP, and she referred us to Yorkhill Children's hospital. The appointment was this morning, so off Orla and I went to see the orthopaedic paediatrician. He demonstrated to me that there isn't a problem with Orla's joints by getting her to stand on her tiptoes and showing me that when she uses her muscles, her feet are perfectly shaped. And then he demonstrated what's really going on - Orla is extremely supple as a result of having a degree of hypermobility (she's double-jointed, in old fashioned parlance). It runs in my family - I can touch the inside of my wrist with my thumb too (although not as impressively as Orla!) and I can turn my left thumb so that it faces backwards. My sister can bend her fingers, elbows and knees into some pretty gross-looking positions too. It's not harmful, and he said it's very common in children and most people grow out of it (although some, like my sister and I, retain some aspects into adulthood). Most importantly, she doesn't need any special footwear. He commented that she could be a good ballet dancer, but I'm not so sure - I still think height may be prohibitive!

As I was at home anyway, I dropped Orla off at nursery. It was the first time I had met her other teacher, Miss Munro. She seems very nice. Orla was much better going into the nursery than I thought she would be. A bit of protestation, but no tears. In fact, she wandered off while I was talking to Miss Munro and sat in the book corner - her favourite place, apparently! They clean the children's teeth at nursery, but Miss Munro said Orla wouldn't let her do hers. When I was cleaning Orla's teeth tonight, she said to me out of nowhere, "Miss Munro's toothpaste is too dirty for me." I asked her what colour it was, and she said white. I asked her if she didn't like the taste, but she refused to elaborate any further.