When you go to a baby products store, you immediately realize that many of the objects are related to the lack of psychomotor capacity of children. When they are babies, there is no lack of gadgets with wheels, among which the stroller would be, and others without them, such as the hammock, in the baby the baby is at first rather lying down to sit down, passing through the harness with a spring that hangs from the Door frame or seat that swings alone.
Some are more necessary than others (although it could also be said that some are more unnecessary than others), but we are many parents who sting and think that our children need something that holds them to move and something that keeps them until they are able to move by themselves, either crawling, crawling or walking.
Among all these gadgets we can find the walker, which is a kind of frame with a seat in which the baby sits or stands up, touching the ground and with which he slowly begins to move. There are those who say they are doing well and there are those who say no, that their legs are curved or that it is bad for their backs. In this post we will try to answer the typical question: Walker, yes or no?
The walker can cause accidents
The main reason why the use of the walker is not advised is because it can cause accidents. Babies begin to walk, normally, about 12-14 months, some before and others later, however at these ages it does not make much sense to give them a walker, because they are already walking or about to do so.
The walker is usually offered to a child around 7-10 months, because parents observe that their child wants to stand up all day (at the moment when you take them from the armpits they force to get up) and because they believe that The walker will help them learn to walk.
At these ages children are still small for many things and, one of them, normally, is to have freedom of movement vertically. A 13-month-old child is not the same as a nine-year-old boy, who, although he goes with a walker, stands the same. In that position you can reach dangerous places, you can touch things, throw on the tablecloths and hurt yourself with objects that, without the walker, you would not know.
According to the Spanish Association of Pediatrics, the walker is the second cause of accidents in children in the second half of life. A study conducted in a French hospital revealed that a large percentage of children with head trauma visited between 2003 and 2005 had suffered an accident with the walker.
In short, the walker is dangerous for children and for this reason there are some countries outside the European Union where its sale is prohibited.
The walker does not teach or help to walk
In addition to dangerous, the walker has another negative point: does not teach or help to walk (Because if it still worked for something, then one is very careful where the child is and is there, but that is not even that).
A study done in Ireland concluded that children who used a walker had more difficulty developing gait and other motor activities, probably because they learned to walk by developing some muscles, but not others that are the ones that serve them to maintain balance.
Let's say that the bad thing about a walker in psychomotor development is that all the time a baby spends in the walker is time that is not on the floor. So many children get used to being always upright and skip the phase of living on the ground, in which they would have learned to crawl, crawl, spin and do dozens of movements by themselves, thus developing their muscles in a way harmonious (if they control the postures, when not being forced, there is no asymmetric development and the movements are fluid) and learning to move as they know their bodies and the tactile sensations that they offer (they notice their body in contact with the floor, legs, hands, head, the force they must do to stay “on all fours”, the movement they must do to sit down or lie down, etc.).
On the other hand, when we do not let them live on the ground and “force” them to be upright, there are many who do not even crawl, which is not that it is bad, but a range of positions and positions that are lost They help to know your body and that allows them something as basic as knowing what to do if they fall (many of the babies who do not learn to crawl suffer when they fall, because they do not know how to move on “four legs”).
Does your back suffer or your legs arch?
When a baby asks and wants to be upright, that is, when he is the one who does it is because he is prepared for it. If a baby can be in a walker playing quietly, it sure does not bother his back and, if so, he would be the one who would let him know, crying to get out of it in order to get a more comfortable posture.
As for the legs, I have never read bibliography that associates a walker with a bad formation of the legs. In fact, I asked this question to a traumatologist very up-to-date in childhood pathology and he said no, that he had never seen any child with bowed legs because of the walker or saw that it was possible.
Conclusions
The walker is another of many unnecessary elements that many parents have believed, for whatever reason, that our children would need. It is not that it is as if to burn it at the stake, because I believe that moderate use does no harm, but the risks involved must be taken into account.
The walker is not a place to leave the child for a while while the adult is going to do something else, but a place where you must be constantly guarded. If you use a little bit a day there is no problem because, as they say, "once a year it does not hurt", however, if a child spends too much time in it, the key element of his psychomotor development will be lost, soil.
So if you have one, they have given it to you or you plan to buy it, know that it is an expendable object in which the baby can spend some time playing. Value yourself if it is worth it or not to get one of them.
