My 9 month old is in a wierd place developmentally at the moment and it's very frustrating for all of us. I'm worried I'm creating problems for later and actually slowing her development by helping her too much so just wondering how to deal with it all....
At the moment she can get on all fours from sitting, and can pull up on me. If I prop her against the sofa she'll stand there for ages and will walk along holding onto it and if I sit her with toys she'll play pretty happily for a reasonable amount of time (30 mins or more) if I keep distracting her or bringing her new toys and sitting her up when she falls over. However, she can't crawl, can't get into crawling or sitting position from lying down and can't pull up on anything except my hands. What this means is that over and over again our days goes like this: Sit her down with toys. She tries to crawl and falls over. Rolls about a bit then gets bored and starts shouting to be pulled up to sitting. As soon as I do that she tries to stand. I give her toys to play with while sitting. Repeat.
If she's sitting, pretty soon she'll start shouting to pull up to stand. If I sit next to her she shouts and straight away looks for my hands to pull up on. If I leave the room she's fine for a few minutes til she wants to stand. Then she starts shouting. It's driving me mad! If I let her stand for a while and let her walk round the room a bit she'll then sit and play by herself much better, but then we get the falling over / crawling thing, which quickly turns into the "Oh, you're here! In that case I want to stand" thing.
So.... any tips for how I should be dealing with all this? Should I respond to her shouts, sit her up / let her stand and then put her back to playing with her toys again for as long as possible? I try to distract her with new stuff wherever possible but if I ignore her shouts for too long she just has a tantrum. Also, am I slowing her development at all by helping her into sitting / standing positions rather than letting her try and work on it herself? I leave her as long as possible but she just gets frustrated really quickly if I leave her and I'm paranoid she's not getting enough opportunity to try things out for herself.
Everyone keeps telling me it's easier when they can't crawl but this is all so frustrating for both of us!
