A YouTube episode (Episode 321) by Hallie Bulkin questioning the removal of crawling from infant developmental milestone checklists. The speaker argues they do not understand why crawling would be eliminated, notes that parents are being told crawling is "not a milestone," and reports anecdotal effects where pediatricians reassure parents at checkups rather than flagging delayed crawling. The piece critiques the rationale and downstream effects on parental guidance.
Chapters
I believe that one of the rolling milestones was also removed, like either back to belly or belly to back and right, crawling was eliminated. And I have a lot to say on this topic, which is that I don't really understand the reason for that unless they were just trying to condense the milestone checklist. I'm not really sure why crawling would be eliminated altogether when for thousands of years babies are crawling. Like, it doesn't really make sense. And unfortunately the trickle down effect has led to parents being told that crawling is not a milestone. Don't worry about it. Again, going back to. As long as your baby can get from point A to point B or your baby will walk eventually, just don't worry about it. And that's the results. That's the effect that has happened. And I hear this from parents all the time, which is they go to their pediatrician, right, Their baby is at the nine month checkup, baby's not crawling, baby's not making attempts to move, and they're like, don't worry about it. There's no milestone that they're checking off, right? There's nothing there for them to say. And I question that.
