Hit a wall with speech therapy
Mrs. Destructo
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The budget for developmental services in my state was cut to practically nothing about a month ago, so now the only kids with a diagnosis of autism or CP qualify for EI services.
We had a PT eval yesterday @ our children's hospital, and one of my sons does need PT, which is going to be a pain in the butt to get him enrolled in since EI pretty much doesn't exist any more, but it will be doable.
The PT said that she's not a speech expert, but she does think both of my boys need speech therapy and she said she'd add their name to the waiting list for an evaluation.... a waiting list that's several months long. So I went home and called a few numbers on the list she gave me, and ALL of their waiting lists are at least 4 months long. Just for an evaluation.
Apparently the private therapy places are being flooded because people are just finding out that they're losing their EI services. This sucks!!
Re: Hit a wall with speech therapy
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Ouch. That does suck.
While you wait to get an eval, if you want me to try and come up with some ideas/suggestions for you, just let me know! I'm more than happy to help.
I'm so sorry! Where do you live?
Ugh. I worry about that happening to us.. We do get therapy through our insurance, but it's limited to 26x/year which obviously wouldn't cover our once a week therapy.. especially since we're about to start PT on top of OT.
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PP- thanks! I would appreciate any tips you have up your sleeve. I've been doing the usual stuff of repeating words, making sure they're watching my mouth when I talk, and I've been signing a bit.
Tricia - we're in Arizona.
Ugh. Sorry.
We had our speech eval about two weeks ago. They said based on ds's adjusted age he was only mildly delayed and didn't qualify. He has NO words, has never said "mama", "dada" or anything. He hardly ever babbles (my husband calls him Silent Bob) and only has one sound that he makes sometimes "buh". Seriously...if that doesn't qualify him, WTH will?
Anyway, they pulled out the income chart and at our income level we'd have to pay 100% of services anyway so we might as well go the private route if we decide to get therapy.
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Mrs. Destructo - what do they boys say/try to say? Do they babble? Do they try to imitate what you say? I'm just trying to get a gauge as to where they are at so I can give you some appropriate tips.
Mrs. Manners - Olivia is EXACTLY the same (well was until we started seeing some improvement). She used to literally go the whole day without making a single "talking" sound. Would you like me to put together some suggestions for you as well?
I will be doing a post some time today (might be tonight) on my preemie blog that is related to speech. I also have some signing posts on there that might help. I'll try to go back through and tag posts that are related to speech. Most of them are probably under the Development category if you look.
I'll try to have some suggestions for you no later than tomorrow am.
I would love your suggestions, whenever you have a chance to give them.
Just to expand in case it will help:
In addition to not making any vocal sounds (except the occassional "buh"), he doesn't wave, he doesn't clap, he doesn't point or nod, nothing to imitate us in a physical or verbal way. We had his hearing checked and it's perfectly fine. The specialist said they felt like he was concentrating on his physical skills because he learned to crawl, pull to stand, cruise and walk within a two month period. He's very playful, very good at walking, crawling stairs and problem solving (ie. I need to move this object to get to that one, if I wind this knob the jack-in-the-box will open, etc) so I don't worry about his mental or physical development at all. His verbal development is the only area where I'm concerned about a delay.
ETA: I also wanted to add that he does hear spanish during the day because our nanny speaks to him exclusively in spanish. This may contribute slightly to the delay.
PP- Leo says "dat?" for "what's that?". He'll point at something he wants and screech "dat!" until we give it to him. Drake points and grunts, but he doesn't say anything at all yet. Neither of them say mama, dada or bottle. Neither of them nods or shakes their heads. They do seem to understand most of what we say to them, so I think their hearing is okay. They will also follow simple commands - and they'll cry if I say "no" too emphatically to them.