During RA Flares, She Stopped Lifting Her Toddler From the Floor

The cereal was already going soft when Erin realized she could not open the milk.

Her five-year-old watched from the kitchen table. Her younger child, who was two and weighed 28 pounds, stood against her knees and asked to be picked up. Erin held the carton between her forearms, tried once more with both hands, then set it down. Her fingers would not close around the cap.

Beside the cereal bowls lay a notebook. Erin had started it in March 2023, after a rheumatoid arthritis flare narrowed her mornings to a set of movements she could no longer count on: turning a doorknob, pulling on a small sock, lowering herself to the floor and getting back up.

The notebook was not a symptom diary. It held brief records of what had gone wrong and what had worked instead. On that morning, she wrote milk cap and floor lift. Later, when her hands moved more freely, she added handled cup and couch.

Erin is a composite drawn from interviews with patient advocates who parent young children while living with rheumatoid arthritis. The details belong to no single family, but the scene was familiar to all of them. A flare could make an ordinary morning feel newly designed against the body that had to move through it.

Erin had lived with rheumatoid arthritis for four years before her younger child was born. She knew the heat in her knuckles and the deep fatigue that did not lift after sleep. What changed during this flare was the loss of range. Her wrists resisted bending.

Her knees made the floor difficult to reach, while pain in her shoulders turned a quick scoop of a child into a movement she could not trust.

For eleven weeks, mornings began with uncertainty. Some days she could button a shirt. On others, she could not press the tab on a diaper or steady a full bowl while walking. The children still woke hungry, wanted the same socks, and leaned their whole bodies toward her without warning.

The morning moved to the table

At first, Erin tried to preserve the old routine. She dressed both children in their bedroom, carried the toddler downstairs, and stood at the counter to make breakfast. By the time shoes came out, her hands were shaking from effort and she had little movement left for the rest of the day.

The notebook began to change that. She looked at the repeated entries and saw that the stairs and floor were taking more from her than breakfast itself, so she moved clothing downstairs and started dressing the younger child while seated at the table. Her child stood between her knees or climbed onto a nearby chair with another adult present.

Fasteners disappeared from weekday clothes. Erin stopped treating this as a small defeat every morning. Shirts went over heads. Shoes opened wide enough for the children to push in their own feet, though the results were sometimes backward and often slow.

Her older child learned to pour milk from a small container. Erin stayed close, with both forearms resting on the table, and wiped spills later rather than reaching quickly to prevent them. The toddler ate from a bowl that did not need to travel far. On severe days, breakfast was whatever Erin could place on the table without gripping a pan.

The routine did not become smooth. One morning the older child cried because a preferred shirt was still upstairs, while the toddler emptied cereal onto the table and Erin could not move fast enough to stop either event. She sat there with swollen hands around a handled cup, listening to both children, then wrote shirt downstairs in the notebook after they left.

Her partner shifted part of the work before leaving home, and relatives covered some mornings during the worst stretch. Those changes mattered, though they did not erase the hours when Erin was the only adult in the room and a child needed help with a shoe, a toilet, or a body that had dropped to the floor in protest.

She told her specialist how sharply her mobility had changed. Her treatment plan was reviewed, but relief was not immediate, and the family still needed a way through the days already happening. An occupational therapist later looked at the movements that caused the most trouble in Erin’s home and helped her think through where she sat, how the children approached her, and which lifts could be removed rather than improved.

That distinction stayed with her. She had been searching for a better way to lift her toddler from the floor. Instead, she stopped making the floor the place where lifting began.

Play came within reach

Before the flare, Erin spent long stretches on the rug building roads and arranging small animals. During those eleven weeks, getting down could hurt less than getting back up, which meant she sometimes remained on the floor after the children had moved on.

She tried watching from the couch. The children kept carrying toys away from her, and she felt like a person supervising play rather than part of it. The notebook recorded this more plainly: couch too far.

The next change was small. Erin cleared one end of the kitchen table and let play happen there. Toy cars crossed strips of tape. Blocks rose near her elbow.

She could keep her forearms supported while moving one piece at a time, and the children could circle the table without climbing across her legs.

Messy play changed too. Instead of carrying bins or setting up on the floor, she placed a small amount of material on a tray while seated. Some days her hands could not manage that. The children drew while she named what she saw, or they brought books to the couch and turned the pages themselves.

Physical affection had to shift with play. The toddler still arrived with arms raised, expecting to be gathered up. Erin began sitting before the child reached her, then opened her arms so the toddler could climb beside her. When the child wanted her on the rug, Erin sometimes said that her knees were staying on the couch.

The child objected. Then a book landed in Erin’s lap.

Outside the house, the limits showed more sharply. A playground built around climbing required quick reaches and sudden lifting, so Erin went only when another adult could handle those moments. She missed some outings. On other days she sat near a sandbox while the children brought her cups of sand, one after another, until the space beside her shoes filled up.

The notebook held fewer words by then. Table play. Books on couch. Another adult at playground.

Erin was not building a program; she was leaving herself reminders for the next morning, when pain and interrupted sleep might make every adaptation feel newly discovered.

The lift that did not happen

The hardest change involved the younger child’s body. At 28 pounds, the toddler was light enough that Erin had previously lifted without planning and heavy enough that a sudden shift could pull at her wrists and shoulders.

During the flare, she stopped lifting from the floor unless there was an immediate safety need. At home, the toddler climbed onto the couch before settling into her lap. For the car, Erin allowed more time for the child to climb into place while she stayed close, following the approach reviewed for her family’s vehicle and her mobility. Her partner handled the transfers that could not be changed.

There were failures. Once, after a fall, the toddler reached for her and Erin reacted before thinking. Pain ran through her wrist, and she had difficulty holding a cup for the rest of the day. The child was fine.

Erin wrote reached after fall in the notebook, pressing lightly because gripping the pen hurt.

She did not become detached from her children. She became deliberate. Hugs happened while she was seated. Comfort sometimes meant a child climbing into the space beside her rather than being lifted into it, and although that felt wrong at first, the toddler soon began backing toward the couch whenever a lap was wanted.

Five months after the notebook began, Erin could move more freely on many mornings. She still kept clothing downstairs. Table play remained. The children had grown used to climbing toward her, though the toddler sometimes raised both arms from the floor and waited.

On those days, Erin sat on the couch and patted the cushion. The child climbed up, turned around, and dropped into her lap. The notebook stayed beside the cereal bowls.

Questions people ask

How did she get young children dressed during an RA flare?

Erin moved weekday clothing downstairs and dressed her toddler while seated instead of repeatedly using stairs or kneeling on the floor. Clothes with difficult fasteners were set aside. Her older child did more independently, while another adult covered parts of the routine when Erin’s hands or knees were especially restricted.

What did playtime look like when she could not sit on the floor?

Play shifted to the kitchen table and couch. The children brought cars, blocks, drawings, and books within reach, while Erin supported her forearms and joined in without repeated lowering or rising. Some playground visits required another adult because sudden reaching and lifting remained part of the setting.

How did she handle lifting her toddler?

She removed some lifts from the day. Her toddler climbed onto the couch before moving into her lap, and car transfers changed after an occupational therapist reviewed the family’s situation. Her partner handled movements that could not be adapted. Erin still lifted during an immediate safety moment, but she no longer treated floor lifting as routine.

Did the changed routine make flare days predictable?

No. Her mobility still varied, help was not always available, and children did not follow the plan written down for them. The notebook gave Erin a record of what had reduced strain before. On difficult mornings, she opened it beside the cereal bowls and read the last few lines.