Proud Mama

I an unbelievably excited to write this post! Last summer was a turning point for E. I had had concerns about his speech and didn't know whether to wait it out or intervene. Everyone in our family kept telling us to wait it out, that he would start talking when he wanted. Paul and I finally decided to refer him to the AZ early intervention program. Within two weeks, I was contacted and we set a date for his evaluation. It was two days after his 2nd birthday. His cognitive, receptive communication, gross motor, fine motor, social/emotional, and adaptive/self-help skills were all within typical limits (between 85 and 115). His expressive communication score was 68: significant delay. His foray speech therapy session started about a month later. We started with one every week, then went to every other, the one every 3-4 weeks. I asked his speech pathologist, Erin, to do another evaluation on him again to see how he is progressing. She only tested his receptive and expressive language today and the scores were amazing. He scored a 118 in receptive and a 119 in expressive! I was SO proud of how he did! During the evaluation, E said some funny and intelligent comments to her questions. 1. She asked him to put a beach ball on the couch, which he did. Then she asked him to put the Diego ballon in the baby swing. He told her no. She gave him a quizzical look and then he said, "No, baby swing too little!" 2. Erin showed E several pictures, including a bike. She asked him to point to the one that we could "ride on". E looked for a moment, she asked him again, and he said "paper". She wasn't sure why he said that because it wasn't a picture from which to choose. But I said that he must have heard her say "write on". 3. Another moment I remember was when she asked E, "Where do you sleep?" E answered by saying bed. But he then continued by saying, "Big boys sleeping in bed. Daddy sit by door. Too too too too far away!" He has come such a long way! Erin said that E was able to infer and solve analogies, things that kids at five years of age are expected to do. When Erin gave me the results, I almost started to cry. I'm grateful to her and the work she did with E and what she taught us so that we could help him. I'm so glas that I didn't listen to everyone that said he didn't need "help". He is an incredible and smart little boy. I'm so proud of him and I'm proud to be his Momma!