Speech concerns

Starishna

At what age would you be concerned about speech development. My DD turned 15 months on Monday and still hasn't said Mama or Dada. She can babble mamamamama randomly. At this point when should I be concerned and is there anything to help her?

pb_bride

DS is 15.5m and he still has zero words.  I was concerned and mentioned this to the pedi at the 15m appt.  The pedi wasn't concerned at all.  In fact, he said he wouldn't worry until DS is 2 and still not talking.  I try not to worry much and will see how things are at 18m.  DS has no problems understanding us and can make his needs known by pointing and making noises.  I read to DS a lot (I SAH) but we are a bilingual family.  

g8trkim

At 15 months I wouldn't worry especially since there are babbles and attempts at sounds.

ashiscute

This is something you really need to trust your gut on as you know your child best.  At 15 mos my DD had zero words and I was concerned.  However, she hardly babbled at all and the sounds she did use were the same ones she'd used at 7 or 8 months with no progress.  She did not imitate me at all.  She did not make sounds in play, or while we were reading, or singing.  She did not do animal sounds.  She would point and say "eh" every once in awhile.  She did not have any issues with receptive language.  

All of these factors combined had me worried so I brought it up to my pedi at her 15 mo checkup and he was not concerned.  He told me all the stuff about language explosions but I pushed and got her evaluated by EI.  She qualified and started speech therapy 2 months later.  She added maybe 5 words by the time she turned 2.  If I had waited for the language explosion I would have waited too long because it didn't come till after 2.5 for her.  She has since been diagnosed with a speech disorder.  

I'm not trying to freak you out and it's very unlikely your child will deal with these issues but I just wanted to stress that you need to trust your gut and really pay attention to your child.  Especially to her skills beyond actual word production.

With my DD we worked on her imitating silly faces and sounds and then moved to words.  We did this in the mirror and she loved it.  We also used signs and that was a huge help for my DD.  She doesn't need them now but still uses some occasionally.  Good luck!

singingirl96

ashiscute said it well. 

If you're concerned you should look into your local "infant and toddlers' program.  It is usually through the public school system.  It is readily available just about everywhere and it is FREE!

At 15 months my son was the exact same way and our pediatrician was also not concerned.  He still has no words other than mama.  He doesn't say dada or imitate sounds, so we're still concerned.   It takes a while to get an evaluation appointment so I would call now if I were you.  They also sent my son for a hearing test (also FREE) and he passed, so that was comforting. 

He recently started his speech therapy appointments.  Still no progress, but we just started.  These are FREE as well. 

Dubsgirlie

From a speech therapists point of view: go with your gut as a parent. Pedis like to think they're the experts on EVERYTHING, but truly they aren't. You be surprised at how often parents wait to long to have an evaluation done because their pediatrician said to wait. At 15 mo, not having a ton of words isn't a big deal, but there should be more than reduplicated babbling. PP had a lot of good advice for fostering language development. Good luck!

christinasullie37

I am also concerned for my 16 month old. She does not imitate sounds at all, and every response or "word" is ba. We have been working on teaching signs bit has yet to use them. We talk to her constantly, read non stop, and play with her non stop. My pedi said he's not worried nor is my dh. Dh refuses to let me call EI. Everyone tells me to stop worrying but I can't.

Dubsgirlie

theresat858 said:

IMO, there is too much concern on early speech development on these boards. Kids will develop at their own rates. You can't force a kid to talk early if a kid isn't ready, and all of the speech therapy in the world isn't going to help.

I didn't start talking until I was 2.5. When I did start talking, I spoke in full sentences. I never did single word speech. It was a personality thing - I like to fully understand something before I do it.  Forcing words out of me earlier would not have changed anything.  I ended up with a 4.0 from a top-rated university (and now have a phd), so I'm pretty sure not talking until 2.5 didn't negatively affect me from an academic point of view.

A few kids might need help from services, and your pedi should be able to refer you...but most pedis aren't concerned until after 18 months because of the leaps that occur with most children between 15-18 months. 

I completely disagree. There's a LOT of research, and I mean a lot, that proves how important early speech development is. States spend a lot of money on EI for a reason. Also, I used to work in EI, I promise you there are ways to get a kid to talk. While I do agree that some kids are just late talkers, some kids have more serious things going on (ex, apraxia) which would only come up during a speech eval. Again, parents should always trust their gut. There's no harm in requesting an eval.

Dubsgirlie

And you don't have to wait for a pediatrician to make a referral. You're the parent - you can do it!

ashiscute

christinasullie37 said:

I am also concerned for my 16 month old. She does not imitate sounds at all, and every response or "word" is ba. We have been working on teaching signs bit has yet to use them. We talk to her constantly, read non stop, and play with her non stop. My pedi said he's not worried nor is my dh. Dh refuses to let me call EI. Everyone tells me to stop worrying but I can't.

I was in the same boat.  No one thought I should call EI.  Everyone kept saying "well so and so knows so and so who didn't talk till they were 3" or whatever.  And I had a hard time figuring out what that had to do with my child.  If you are worried there could be a reason so best to look into it.  If pushed your pedi will refer you to EI.  

And if my DH said I couldn't call I would tell him F- off.  My DH didn't want me to call but he never said I shouldn't.  And I am so glad I did!!!!!

jennyelf

Our LO also wasn't saying anything at 15 months. Both DH and I also have a few members in our family that are on the Autistic Spectrum so we had some concerns. Pedi listened to our concerns and agreed that an evaluation was a good first move. LO was evaluated and qualified for speech help. They gave us some exercises we could do at home, so we did those. We delayed a bit on making the first appointment and then the week I finally made it, all of the sudden, LO started saying words. Within a week he had 10 words we could identify. By 18 months he had over 100. When they say language explosion, they aren't kidding.

The evaluation is free, and I honestly don't see much harm in getting a professional to just take a look. Worst case, you start getting help early. Best case, you've spent 2 hours of time and it turns out LO is doing fine.

Dubsgirlie

@jennyelf - that's exactly what I always tell parents when they ask if their child should be evaluated - there is no "worst case scenerio". It NEVER hurts to get evaluated if there are any concerns.

nikkisun54

Dubsgirlie said:

And you don't have to wait for a pediatrician to make a referral. You're the parent - you can do it!

How do you do this??? My DS is having some of these issues as well (I've been lurking on this convo). I was always under the impression that ped had to provide us with the referral to call. I did a Google search a while back to try and figure out how to schedule an appt. myself, but I was left with a plethora of info, none of it pointing me in the right direction. 

Is there a link anyone could provide? We're in MD, if that makes a difference at all...

singingirl96

Is there a link anyone could provide? We're in MD, if that makes a difference at all...

Hi.  I'm in MD too.  You have to look at your local public schools system.  We're in Baltimore County so we looked into BCPS Infants and Toddlers.  Here is the link to that https://www.bcps.org/offices/infants_toddlers/ If you're not in BC,  just do a search for your county's Infant and Toddlers program.  They'll ask you some questions and if they feel your child could qualify, they'll set up an appointment for an evaluation and a hearing test.  All for free.  No physician referral needed.

Dubsgirlie

Dubsgirlie said:

And you don't have to wait for a pediatrician to make a referral. You're the parent - you can do it!

How do you do this??? My DS is having some of these issues as well (I've been lurking on this convo). I was always under the impression that ped had to provide us with the referral to call. I did a Google search a while back to try and figure out how to schedule an appt. myself, but I was left with a plethora of info, none of it pointing me in the right direction. 

Is there a link anyone could provide? We're in MD, if that makes a difference at all...

For some places its the school district, for others it's the county (ours is our county healthy department).  I bet if you called either place, however, they would be able to tell you who you need to contact. Good luck!

Dubsgirlie

Sorry, my previous post wouldn't let me type outside of the grayed quote block, but my response is in there!

Kk218

I wouldn't be concerned if your lo is babbling at least, my nephew was diagnosed with apraxia and he never babbled like most babies. I would be especially concerned if my child couldn't say mama or dada by 24 mos.

Dubsgirlie

Kk218 said:

I wouldn't be concerned if your lo is babbling at least, my nephew was diagnosed with apraxia and he never babbled like most babies. I would be especially concerned if my child couldn't say mama or dada by 24 mos.

Some kids with apraxia babble and some don't. Your kid should be saying much more than mama and dada by 24 months.

ashiscute

Dubsgirlie said:

Kk218 said:

I wouldn't be concerned if your lo is babbling at least, my nephew was diagnosed with apraxia and he never babbled like most babies. I would be especially concerned if my child couldn't say mama or dada by 24 mos.

Some kids with apraxia babble and some don't. Your kid should be saying much more than mama and dada by 24 months.

My DD was diagnosed with apraxia of speech in October.  She did babble starting about 7 mos old.  As she was my first I didn't realize how limited her babbling was and how infrequently she did it.  By 15 mos she had not added many new sounds.  Just baba, mama, dada but no other vowels for sure.