We have a special club in our extended family. It's called the Speech Therapy Club, and it has more members than you would expect in one extended family. Dallin made a brief foray into the club when he was five years old, but didn't do more than just visit a few times and be on his way. However, it appears that Preston is now a card-carrying member.
We've been a bit concerned about Preston because up until a couple of weeks ago, he hadn't started to babble or use any consonant sounds, something he should have mastered between four and six months of age. Our doctor suggested an evaluation by DDI Vantage, the early intervention people in our area. I put it off for a month or two because Preston has been pretty laidback about most of his developmental milestones so far, but finally I made the call and got the assessment set up.
After playing with him and observing him for 1.5 hours this morning, the verdict came in: a severe delay in expressive language. From what the evaluator saw, he is operating at about the level of a two-month-old baby. Now, she noted, and I also feel, that he is probably not quite that delayed. He can produce more sounds, but he just chose not to show off for the testers today. We have heard him over the past couple of weeks beginning to attempt to babble, it's just very, very infrequent, so I was not surprised that the evaluators were not able to hear a single consonant from him. I think that if they had been able to adjust for what he CAN do, he might have made it to about the 3-4 month old level, maybe he would have graduated into the "moderately delayed" category, but would still have easily qualified for early intervention services.
So one more thing to add to Mommy's already over-full plate!
We've been a bit concerned about Preston because up until a couple of weeks ago, he hadn't started to babble or use any consonant sounds, something he should have mastered between four and six months of age. Our doctor suggested an evaluation by DDI Vantage, the early intervention people in our area. I put it off for a month or two because Preston has been pretty laidback about most of his developmental milestones so far, but finally I made the call and got the assessment set up.
After playing with him and observing him for 1.5 hours this morning, the verdict came in: a severe delay in expressive language. From what the evaluator saw, he is operating at about the level of a two-month-old baby. Now, she noted, and I also feel, that he is probably not quite that delayed. He can produce more sounds, but he just chose not to show off for the testers today. We have heard him over the past couple of weeks beginning to attempt to babble, it's just very, very infrequent, so I was not surprised that the evaluators were not able to hear a single consonant from him. I think that if they had been able to adjust for what he CAN do, he might have made it to about the 3-4 month old level, maybe he would have graduated into the "moderately delayed" category, but would still have easily qualified for early intervention services.
So one more thing to add to Mommy's already over-full plate!
Comments
An ENT evaluation is a great idea--I second it! Remember that it was the DDI Eval that convinced me to get an ENT evaluation?!! Get into the best one you can. A little fluid in the ears can cause a lot of problems. I don't recommend an adenoidectomy ever be done at the same time tubes are placed. Just because of what I've learned in the past year. I think if it were me now I would get tubes, if needed, and then IF there is still a problem have the palate evaluated and THEN consider the adenoids. Just butting in with my two cents. Since One Fish did :)
It's actually a miracle any of us learn to speak!
Anyway, the good thing about EI services is that they come to you, so that at least, is a big relief. For us, it also costed next to nothing.
I think the ENT suggestion is a really good one. We've had good experiences with the ENT clinic at Primary's. Our favorite there is Dr Grimmer, and we had several not great experiences with Dr Park, so I'd avoid him.
I'm also needing to send Linnea an email apparently, because they're wanting to remove max's tonsils, adenoids, and put in a second set of tubes before winter hits. I'm wondering now what her experience was.