From the moment Austin turned 3 months old, I could tell he was going to be spirited little fellow. His sly smile gave me a clue that he was going to tell me what was on his mind, just as soon as he could.
Well, nine months came around and I was dying for a "mama" or "dada". It was coming, I could feel it. His peers were addressing their parents as such....Austin was on the brink.
Then came fourteen months and we heard his first real word, "shoes". It was clear as ever. He was fascinated with them, knew what they were and grabbed them anytime we asked him to get his "shoes". Two weeks of proud parent bliss. He even added "two" to "shoes" and we heard "two shoes". Pretty cool.
And then it stopped. He would say "wuf" every once in awhile, when he saw the dogs, but other than babbling, nothing was clear again. He slowly increased to what I would call a babbling "pontification", however. He stands proudly and gives us his "four scores and seven years ago...." speech, we were his audience. Anyone that has seen or heard it, know exactly what I am talking about. We know he is talking or at least playing a game of talking but it is very garbled and completely intelligible. His speaking manner is what someone that is hearing impaired would be repeating because they may only hear garbled, mumbled sounds. His hearing is perfect however; we had it tested.
The funny thing is that Austin understands everything. He knows what we are saying, he takes direction very well and you can see his little brain working behind those bright blue eyes. This kid is smart. We are the unlucky ones that are unable to hear what's on his mind.
Despite some downplaying by others of my worries, I decided to call the early intervention program in Georgia, called Babies Can't Wait , and asked for an evaluation. They have an initial evaluation done using parents and/or caregiver observations of milestones and then they have an hour or so long evaluation done by a group of professionals, usually a Speech Language Professional and an Occupational Therapist. They came to the house, where he would be more comfortable and "played" with him while observing where he fell into a range of milestones. He scored high in all areas except communication, more specifically, expressive communication. They recommended a speech therapist and some occupational therapy because it was suspected that he had "low tone" in his oral motor movements.
It has been a little over a month of weekly sessions and Austin is working really hard. The ongoing diagnosis is Apraxia of Speech at this point. It is not a delay of speech but more of the brain's inability to orchestrate the finite series of movements that allow us to form words. He is back to saying "shoes" again, which I just think is hilarious and is saying "da", whether that is for dogs or his Daddy.....probably both. He also says "ire" for tire (yet another obsession).
Although I had known something was wrong for quite some time and was leading the charge to have him evaluated, I have to admit that it has taken me over a month of going through the lessons with him to really understand how serious this is. We recently experienced an entire week of complete frustration for him, hence ours, where he could not express to us what he wanted and would have complete breakdowns all day. If he wasn't crying already, he was on the verge of tears all day and we were just completely defeated. We are now increasing the family's sign language repertoire so that he can express his needs and wants better. It has been recommended to use picture books as well, so we may be creating a total package of communication tools.
Anything to help the little guy finally tell us what is behind that sly smile......
