Asymmetrical Belly Crawling

Exercise program for children who belly crawl using only one side of the body and are not yet able to crawl forward on all fours. The program contains the same exercises as the program Crawling on All Fours and important additions and variations focusing on correcting one-sided belly crawling.

  • Prioritized, simple exercises
  • Designed for busy families
  • Illustrated with pictures & videos
  • Instant & perpetual access
  • Secure payment with QuickPay

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24,00 EUR

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Program description

Crawling on all fours is a key milestone because it strengthens coordination as well as the body’s strength and stability. Crawling therefore forms an important foundation for later motor skills. The vast majority of babies first move forward by belly crawling before they start crawling on all fours.

One-sided belly crawling occurs when this crawling in prone position happens mainly with only one active arm and the opposite leg. Because of the difference in strength, it becomes difficult in the hands-and-knees position to stabilize the weaker arm and leg on all fours well enough for the child to lift and move the stronger arm and leg forward. In most cases, children are still able to push up onto all fours despite the asymmetry, but then have difficulty actually moving forward.

This program contains best-practice home exercises to help your baby move on from one-sided belly crawling to stable and symmetric crawling on all fours, where the right and left sides of the body work in a cross-lateral, alternating pattern. The exercises combine a specific focus on the weaker side with strengthening of the relevant muscles around the shoulders, back, tummy, and hips, as well as targeted stimulation of coordination skills, so that the body becomes more symmetrically strong.

However, the goal of the exercises is not necessarily to achieve perfectly symmetrical belly crawling, as this is often difficult once the asymmetry has become a habit. The real long-term goal is instead strong, stable, alternating crawling on all fours.

The exercises are described in detail and arranged in a logical order. There are both pictures and videos for each exercise so you can see exactly how to do them. All texts, images, and videos are adapted to the side combination you choose, so make sure to choose the correct program version.

Note: If your baby has not yet mastered belly crawling, please choose the program: Belly Crawling.

This program is one of several in the category Crawling on all Fours – read about the differences in the program overview. Please find answers to frequently asked questions below. If you are still unsure which program is the right one for your child, you are very welcome to send an email to maria@develobaby.com.

  • Simple, effective, targeted exercises for baby development

    Maria’s programs made a huge impact on our baby’s development! Her exercises are simple, prioritized, and easy to incorporate on a daily basis. We printed out the asymmetrical belly crawling exercises and taped them up in our living room to do them as often as we could! 1 month later, and our baby is crawling on all fours after building strength through Maria’s exercises where she needed it. Her programs are a game changer!
    Cate, Trustpilot

  • Easy to follow and effective

    I bought the course on asymmetrical crawling. Maria made such a grid and simple instructions on how to help the baby that now after 3 weeks my child crawls perfectly! And I must say that I am not the most fanatical parent! Thank you for such wonderful and effective techniques. It was just the source I was looking for – clear, short and simple! Thank you again! 🙏
    Darya, Trustpilot

Should you work on your child’s one-sided belly crawling, or will it sort itself out?

The answer depends on how big the difference in strength is between the right and left sides of the body, and that can be quite hard to spot if you are not used to looking for it. If the difference is something like 90% strength on one side and only 10% on the other, exercises are often necessary if the goal is for your child to start crawling on all fours. Simply because your child will find it hard to stabilize the weaker arm and leg in the crawling position once they try to move forward. If the difference is closer to, say, 60% strength on one side and 40% on the other, it is quite likely that your child will gradually sort out the belly crawling themselves and move on to crawling without much help.

Because this can be difficult to judge as a parent, my best advice is to look at whether your child previously had, or still has, signs of a preferred side. This means, for example, if your child has preferred to look to one side, has been lying in a banana shape (with the head tipped to one side), shifts their weight onto one arm in tummy time, or perhaps rolls and pivots more easily to one side. These signs tell you there may be a slightly larger strength difference between the two sides. If that is the case, it is very relevant to step in early and work preventively.

Which version of the program do I need?

It can sometimes be difficult to tell the type of asymmetry a baby has. The asymmetry always crosses over the body, which only adds to the confusion. Since it’s important that you choose the correct version, I’ve created two videos with examples to help you choose the correct version. Feel free to watch the example videos below and if in doubt, send me a short video of your child by email at maria@develobaby.com.

Right leg / left arm
  • The baby crawls by pushing off the ground with their right foot and supporting their upper body mostly with the left forearm.
  • The baby will have the easiest time picking up toys with the right hand in the prone position, while the left forearm supports the body weight.
  • The left leg is either bent or straight, but does not contribute at all or only minimally to the crawling movement.
  • Sometimes the asymmetry is most evident in either the legs or the arms. For example, when the child crawls with their right leg and both arms, or when the child crawls without using their legs, pulling forward with the left arm, you should still choose the program version “right leg“.
Asymmetrical Belly Crawling FAQ right
Left leg / right arm
  • The baby crawls by pushing off the ground with their left foot and supporting their upper body mostly with the right forearm.
  • The baby will have the easiest time picking up toys with the left hand in the prone position, while the right forearm supports the body weight.
  • The right leg is either bent or straight, but does not contribute at all or only minimally to the crawling movement.
  • Sometimes the asymmetry is most evident in either the legs or the arms. For example, when the child crawls with their left leg and both arms, or when the child crawls without using their legs, pulling forward with the right arm, you should still choose the program version “left leg“.
Asymmetrical Belly Crawling FAQ left

Frequently asked questions to Asymmetrical Belly Crawling

There may be small signs that are hard for the untrained eye to see, but if there were no previous signs of a preferred side, then the degree of asymmetry is probably very small and there is a good chance that your baby will learn to crawl properly on all fours on their own. However, I would rely more on the present degree of asymmetry: if one leg is very passive in the belly crawl, or if the belly crawl phase has lasted a long time, your baby may still have a high degree of asymmetry. You should of course never feel obligated to do exercises with your baby if you don’t have the time or energy. However, muscle strengthening exercises have no side effects, so rebalancing any muscular asymmetry can only be a positive development for your baby.

I realize that running a family with babies is a busy time and that the amount of energy you have varies greatly from person to person and from day to day. That’s why I’ve organized all the exercises by priority. This means that you can do only the first five exercises if you are short on time, or you can do them all if you enjoy playful exercises with your baby and have plenty of time and energy. There are more than 20 exercises in this program, so you can’t possibly do them every day.

Even if the asymmetry is small, you should choose the Asymmetrical Belly Crawling program. You will get all the crawling exercises from Crawling on All Fours. The difference is in the prioritization (order) of the exercises. Once the asymmetry is corrected, you will regularly do the crawling exercises on all fours.

Frequently asked questions to exercise programs

After completing the purchase process successfully, you can access your exercise program here on the develobaby.com. During payment, enter your email address and password. After successful payment, you will see an additional heading in the menu called “My Programs”, including links to all the exercise programs you have purchased access to. You could be reading your first program in under 60 seconds from purchasing. When you come back to DeveloBaby.com after a few days, the system will have logged you out automatically. Then simply log in again with your email address as your username and the password you chose during the checkout process.

My exercise programs are accessible online here on DeveloBaby.com. As the programs contain video clips that couldn’t be played in PDF or other types of print, there is no downloadable or hard copy version. That said, using a PC/Mac you can in fact print the exercise programs you have purchased by pressing Ctrl+P on Windows and Command+P on MacOS when you are on the exercise program page. However, the programs are not specifically set up for this purpose, so it’s much nicer and more user-friendly to view it directly on your mobile, tablet or computer.

You have perpetual access. However, I am obliged to adhere to certain privacy data regulations (such as GDPR), which state that I cannot store customer data longer than necessary. Therefore, the system limits your access to one year at a time. When a year is about to expire, the system will automatically send you an email so you can easily extend your access if you want to keep it.

No, this would be against the terms & conditions. You purchase access for yourself and the people living in your household. If you, however, buy an exercise program as a grandparent, you can of course share the access with the person you bought it for. In contrast, if you are a manager in an institution and want to procure access to one or more exercise programs for your employees, please write to me so we can work out an agreement on multiple licenses. For contact details and more, please see my Terms and Conditions.

Current legislation states that the usual 14-day right of withdrawal does not apply to digital products. The reason for this is that it is virtually impossible to argue that you haven’t used digital products once you’ve logged in. Therefore, I do not generally offer refunds. Please read more about my return policy under Terms and Conditions.

Yes, I’ve gone to great lengths to explain each exercise in layman’s terms so that everyone can follow. There are also pictures and videos to accompany the exercises, where I perform the exercises on a real baby.

No, certainly not. In my exercise programs, I have put the exercises in prioritized order. There are a lot of exercises in each program, so in principle you can spend your whole day doing exercises if you find it enjoyable, but you can also choose to do the top three or top five, and therefore the most important ones. This makes the exercise programs suitable for everyone, no matter how much time and energy you have to spare.

The exercises are basically just strength training, just like when you go to the gym. They are designed to strengthen your child muscles wrt the exercise programs’ purpose, e.g. addressing back arching. Therefore, exercises will always make your child stronger. Whether your child achieves each milestone with good quality using the exercises depends, of course, on the starting conditions and whether there are any special conditions that would require a individually tailored approach. But no matter what, helping your child build a stronger body will never be in vain. For the vast majority, standardized exercises, as presented in my exercise programs, will help the child move on to the next milestone well and strongly.

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Disclaimer

All content on DeveloBaby.com is based on recognized professional standards in Denmark, and you can expect them to be in line with the advice you receive in the public health system. If you find that your child has pronounced sleep or motor challenges, or that there is a lack of effect from the general exercises, I recommend that you make an appointment with me, either in person or online, so that I can customize the program for your child. If your child is unwell, please always contact your health care provider or physician. Read full disclaimer…