Cerebral palsy what is it you ask!

March is cerebral palsy awareness month so I thought I would write about it as I understand stand it! Yes I know it’s not March just yet on the day I’m posting this but March may become hectic so I wanted to write while I had the time!

Please remember I’m not a health care professional so I did the best I could at explaining everything!

Well cerebral palsy is brain damage either before,during or after birth The brain damage it self is caused by a lack of oxygen to the brain! Cerebral palsy is an umbrella term for a long list of movement disorders! The most common type of cerebral palsy is is spastic cerebral palsy! There are for main types of spastic cerebral palsy quadriplegic which effects all four limbs and some speech as well! The next type of spastic cerebral palsy is triplegia which typically 1 arm and both legs this the least common type of spastic cerebral palsy! The next type of spastic cerebral palsy is diplegic which mainly effects the legs! The last type of spastic cerebral palsy is hemiplegic which effects one arm and one leg on the same side of the body usually.There are many more types of cerebral palsy but it would take my hours to research and write them all down that why I did the four main types of spastic cerebral palsy and because spastic cerebral palsy is the most common type! Now you’re probably thinking what is spastic cerebral palsy the main characteristic of spastic cerebral palsy is spasticity (high muscle tone!) Spasticity makes it hard to control the movement of your body so everyday tasks are ten times harder because you have to not only focus on what you are doing but you also have to focus on making sure the limb is are using is doing what you need it to do to complete the task! No one really knows what caused spasticity in cerebral palsy it is thought that the brain sends out to many signals to contract the muscles and not enough signals to relax the muscles! I like to compare cerebral palsy to a snow flake because it effects everyone differently you can see two different people with the same kind of cerebral palsy but it will effect both individuals different for example they might both have spastic diplegic but one can use a walker for mobility but the other person uses a wheelchair for mobility! Cerebral palsy doesn’t mean people don’t know things so please don’t treat people with cerebral palsy like a two year old cerebral palsy effects our movements not our intelligence! Another thing is don’t just assume we can’t do something and do it for us please ask or if you see someone struggling with something let them ask for help don’t just do it for them! I’ll give you a tip the way someone with cerebral palsy does something may look odd but we learn to adapt because of our physical limitations and we get it done in a way that works for us! There are many other medical conditions that can go along with cerebral palsy and many treatments options but I’m not a health care professional and I don’t want to to give people wrong information so if you have medical questions please take to your doctor or other health care professional! If you have any ideas for what you would you want me to right about next or any questions of how cerebral palsy affects me personally please let me know!