We haven't started speech therapy yet, but I think I am going to get the evaluation rolling soon. The school early intervention program told me they won't start speech therapy until age three. Another speech therapist with 20 years experience told me, she has never started a kid before they reach age two, because their word and sound base isn't developed enough to start working with. So, I am confused. I asked the pediatrician that came in to talk to us during my sons 24 hour EEG, and he feels the sooner the better for speech therapy to begin. He will be two in three months, so I feel it couldn't hurt to just start the evaluation and see what the therapist at his current facility thinks. It is just hard to add more appointments to our already full schedule.
Andy currently has three words he uses often, mama, dada and up. And then there are about six other words that we hear maybe once a week, which is awesome for me. I am going to try to do flash cards more often as well, because I'm sure every bit will help.
Hello, I came across your blog from Top Mommy Blogs. I know this post was a few months ago and I browsed more currently and might have missed it, but where are you with the speech therapy now? My 3 year old daughter has apraxia (speech disorder) and has been in speech therapy since 18 months. There was a lot they did with her even at that young age, and I truly believe starting that early helped her to be where she is today. She also has hypotonia (and is wearing afos!) so in order for her to get the speech through ei at that time we did have to drop some of her OT/PT (where we live 8x/month of ei is the max). For us we felt the speech issue to be the most important, it's the basis for all relationships in life. She has now graduated from ei at home and receives it through the school and with a private therapist. We loved our ei SLP but our new SLP has many different ideas combining both of their knowledge is great! And now her progress is amazing. Don't let "them" hold you back. A lot can be done in speech even at 24 months! I have 3 older "typically developing" boys who just picked up speaking and now i have learned so much on how to teach speech, many parents take these things for granted, it has been an amazing learning experience and has really made me appreciate and be awed by the fact that what really is such a complicated process comes so naturally to so many kids. Watching our daughter develop and hit her milestones has been the joy of my life, she is amazing and all those milestones are all the much sweeter. Good luck with Andy, he sounds like an amazing boy. Becca
ReplyDeleteOur new insurance company is now allowing unlimited speech visits, so we will soon see!
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