Anyone ever have a speech delayed child where that was their only issue?

[HappyLady]

My DS is almost 4.  He's an enigma.  :)  Honestly, even the "experts" can't figure him out.  I had him evaluated at 2.5 and in a lot of areas he scored in the 12 - 18 month range (except with anything physical - he's always been advanced in those areas).  He had speech services over the last year and the difference in his speech is remarkable.  I don't really think it was the speech services that helped him, but rather just time.  I could be wrong, though.

 

Anyway, I just had his meeting with the school district to see if he'd qualify for services for both over the summer and in the fall.  Both of his therapists (he had one for speech and one for special ed) said that they don't recommend he continue with services.  Basically it was because you have to have a severe delay to qualify and they don't think he's delayed enough.  I agreed to it only because I just didn't think they did much for him (I watched his sessions and they did the exact same things I did with him and even told me that I was helping him more than they were).  Now I'm wondering if I made the right decision in agreeing to his services ending.

 

Like I said, he's almost 4, but if I had to guess I'd say he's somewhere in the range of 2.5 - 3 with his speech.  Some sentences he says will come out sounding like a 4 year old (6 - 7 words).  Sometimes we can't understand a word of what he's trying to say.  His speech seems all over the place.  The best way I can describe his speech all around is it's like an adult that came to a foreign country and learned enough of the language to get through life, but you couldn't hold a meaningful conversation with them.

 

I don't really know where to go from here.  Do I wait it out and see how he progresses?  Do I take him to some sort of specialist to get evaluated, and if so, what kind?  A main reason why I'm concerned is because he's still having behavior issues (not ANYTHING like he was having a year ago, though) and I think it's still because he doesn't understand what we're saying or what's going on, or he can't express what he wants to say.  Another issue is sometimes people talk to him and he answers as if he heard something completely different or he doesn't answer at all and it appears like he didn't realize someone was talking to him.  

 

So far, I have him signed up to go to preschool in the fall.  I thought maybe being around kids his age a few times a week would help.  The school is run by two occupational therapists so that might be a bonus as well.

 

I'm just concerned if there's something else going on and we don't start with treatment at an early age that it might take longer to help him.  His speech therapist just said he's "quirky" and whatever weaknesses he'll have in life he'll make up for them with his strengths (don't we all?).

 

Thoughts?  Suggestions?  Am I worrying too much?  :) 

[Crimson Wife]

Sounds like he might have central auditory processing disorder. Most audiologists won't test for that until age 7 or 8, however.

 

Taking him for an evaluation by a developmental pediatrician might be a good idea.

[Zuzu822]

I don't have enough experience with other special needs to offer you advice, except to say that yes, my second son was slow to start talking, and had no other issues. He was early with all other milestones.

 

His receptive language skills were high, and he barely qualified for EI. They took him because of the gap between his receptive and his expressive ability. His speech delay was kind of strange: he tried to talk on an inhale rather than an exhale. He also dropped most of his consonants.

 

He started speech around 2.5 and was just under 4.5 when he was "discharged." No lingering issues. He's almost six now and reading, etc. He talks NON-STOP and is LOUD.  :lol:

 

 

[wapiti]

It is not unusual for some kids with a history of delayed speech to turn up with various types of learning issues down the road.  Sometimes these are not a big deal.  It depends.

 

From what you have written, I'd wonder about the quality of receptive language and about auditory processing.  Did he already have hearing thoroughly evaluated?  I'd probably start by arranging for an evaluation with a private SLP and go from there.  As for the behavior, it depends on the severity and what you're talking about, specifically.

 

 

 

[Χά�ων]

Sounds like he might have central auditory processing disorder. Most audiologists won't test for that until age 7 or 8, however.

 

Taking him for an evaluation by a developmental pediatrician might be a good idea.

This. And my son's reading was affected by his APD severely. But, he did not qualify for services. Actually because he was affected in such a way that his standard IQ score was affected and put him in the low normal range I was told he was just slow and that nothing was wrong. I had him retested and the IQ score was 40pt higher. 

[liber]

My 17 year old had a severe speech delay. At 13 he was diagnosed with CAPD and dyslexia.

[Annie G]

Our ds was speech delayed with no other issues. At 3 he had fewer than 5 words. At 4 he had maybe 25. 

The school psychologist tested him, as did a speech therapist and an audiologist.  They found nothing specific but recommended the school district's preschool for special needs kids, with in class speech therapy.  We couldn't figure out how other kids who were speech delayed were going to help ds overcome his speech delay so we declined their services. We did a private speech therapist for a few months but ds found it stressful and he began sucking his fingers and clinging to his blanket- both habits he had dropped more than a year prior. 

 

We talked to him, worked with him, and let him mature. And he's almost 20 now with no behavioral or academic issues. But that's NOT The norm. 

 

You mention that your son will ignore or not hear when someone is talking to him, or will realize someone is talking but his response doesn't match the question asked. That sounds like something worth investigating.  

 

I'm not sure I'd worry that much about 'other problems' - like learning delays, dyslexia, or such things. Lots of kids have those but no speech delay.  In other words, don't go looking for things to worry about- just deal with the issue in front of you, which is speech that is not consistently intelligible. If you suspect other issues, look into those as your concerns arise. 

[Guest lahbluebonnet]

When my dd was age 4, she was barely speaking 3 word sentences. She had a few learning delays and was released from all therapies due to being high functioning. The therapists said they could tell she had the cognitive skills. In time her speech did catch up, though she did have other struggles. 

She didn't start talking until 3rd grade when she joined Awana club. That so excited her that she talked non-stop about it all the way home. Her sentences were extremely poor but I let her just talk it out for the sheer enjoyment of it. I didn't correct her grammar, I left that for grammar class. This was her time to talk freely, because it was the one time in the week she was excited to talk about anything.  Apart from that, she was quite shy and rarely said anything, though she was quite laid back and content. Quite honestly during this time I despaired, wondering if she'd ever learn how to speak with coherence. 

Then we moved from Texas to Virginia.  She wore costumes to Colonial Williamsburg as we made frequent visits each month. The guests thought she was an employee and asked her many questions, which she was compelled to answer. They and the employees all seemed to take her under their wing and helped her to open up. After a few months of this, my parents were talking to her on the phone (they were still in Texas) and they couldn't believe what a chatter box she had become. =)

She graduated from homeschool and went to college where she is quite the social butterfly. She completed vision therapy a few months ago, continues to work on some weak areas, but is doing quite well with her speech now. It amazes me how this all came about. =)

I thought I'd share our story, as you try to figure out which direction to go for your child. =)     

Blessings,

Laurie

http://teacupsinthegarden.blogspot.com

 

[NASDAQ]

My oldest didnt talk until past three. Second incomprehensible until 5.5 or so. They're five. Sometimes it is just speech.

[PeterPan]

Research delay vs. apraxia.

 

Then have your ped do a spectrum screening to see if that "quirky" is something more.  

[LisaKinVA]

I have two children with speech/phonological delays.  The first started therapy around 8, was in speech therapy for 18 months, and is doing well now.  I received a referral for an evaluation from my pediatrician.  

 

My youngest is currently in speech therapy.  She has always been delayed, but she is also the baby (which I was hoping was most of the issue).  I finally broke down and got the referral last year, and took her for an evaluation as soon as we arrived here in Naples, Italy.  She has massive speech delays -- however, the speech pathologist currently working with her does believe much of her lack-of-progress (so-to-speak) is related to maturity issues (and liking her babyhood).  Next year, her speech therapy will also include about an hour in a K classroom interacting with other children (hoping for more social pressure to speak clearly).  

 

My oldest daughter is considered "highly gifted" -- my youngest daughter (no testing) is considered academically advanced (compared to age mates) and very bright (although teachers believe she will be gifted as well...based upon drawings, sentence structure, visual-spacial manipulations...she had a wide variety of testing done in October, she was only delayed in one area, SPEECH).

 

Oh, there have also been zero auditory issues.  Although, every one of my children can seemingly "not hear" conversations directed at them (IF they are intensely engaged in something else...a book, LEGO, a television show, imaginative play).  To be fair, they come by that trait genetically (I'm notoriously bad about getting lost in my own head...someone could be standing right in front of me and I do not hear them...and I have no auditory issues).  As frustrating as that might be, it's nowhere near as frustrating as being tuned out by ear buds :P)

 

That doesn't rule out auditory issues for your child -- but context can be important, too.

 

I would seek a referral to a specialist from your pediatrician, and go from there.  My 4yo dd's speech is horrible.  Her sentence structure may be advanced, but you have to guess at more than half of the words, and if you don't have context you will be left staring blankly at her wondering where to go from there.  She was never frustrated by not being understood, but she is beginning to exhibit those signs.  The meltdowns you describe I would probably attribute to not being understood -- and that should be addressed.

 

Best wishes.

[Reefgazer]

Mine had speech issues when he was a toddler, but didn't have any other issues then and doesn't now.  He had 2 1/2  years of speech therapy for his issues, with 2 different therapists.  Apparently, it worked. 

[Donna]

I work in Early Intervention and I know there are many, many children out there where speech is their only issue. What may have looked like play to you was very well therapy. In EI, therapists are supposed to work with the parents teaching them ways to interact with their child to help them progress but the therapists should have explained to you what they were doing and why they were doing it. 

 

You may try to have your son evaluated again now that he is a bit older especially if you feel there are still issues with his articulation as therapists may not look at that as an issue until the child is older.

[Cera]

My almost 8 year old was ahead in absolutely everything except articulation.  She is in the middle of being tested for a central auditory processing disorder (though it is a formality, they are almost positive that is the issue).  

 

I would not discontinue speech services if he is still behind.  It can be very difficult to restart them (once enrolled they are eligible until they are caught up, to reenroll they have to be a certain percentage behind).

[MomtoCandJ]

Dd1's only issue was speech. She had three month of EI and a year of speech therapy through HeadStart.

[MEmama]

My son was diagnosed with severe speech apraxia when he was 3. He had a huge vocabulary and no problem communicating with us, but his words were all jumbled up and we needed to translate for everyone else. He was already reading, and had enormous intense interests in other areas, and was advanced socially and academically from his peers (he had insisted on learning the alphabet before 2, for example). His certain Giftedness was not considered or looked at by the evaluator, and she did nothing to address him in a holistic manner. We felt very strongly that his speech issues were due to literally having more to say, more going on in his head, than he had the motor capability to get out at any time. We dropped the therapist and by the end of K, no one would have had any idea there had been an issue.

 

Now, he IS a host of quirks, and whether some are related to the supposed apraxia or not I'll never know, but in the end dropping the therapy was the right choice for him. Do your research and trust your mama intuition. I don't believe there's only one right path. :)

[amyx4]

I had one that only had a speech delay. At that time we lived in a small school district and what they offered for speech (under 5 yr old) was very limited. They wanted to sign him out because they felt he was ready. I was still concerned because outside of our family no one could really understand him. So we looked into using our health insurance at a busy hospital. I don't know if improved due to that change or just his age. At the hospital he got more hours per week plus he was the only kid in the office. At the little public school he was under an hour per week with up to 3 kids in his class.  He's older now with no additional LDs.

[gingersmom]

If you can take him for an evaluation outside the school district.

 

Speech is so much easier and faster to remedy if you do it while they are young. No one wants to be the kindergarten student no one can understand.

 

My son was extremely unhappy when he could not be understood.

[Momof3littles]

Yes, EI services often look like play, but really, it is therapy :)   I worked in EI as a PT.

 

Has anyone expressed concerns about a pragmatic speech issue?  The not reciprocating sometimes just made me wonder.  Does he do anything like echolalia?

 

I would continue services for sure, and consider having a dev. ped consult, even if only to rule out some things at this point.  If hearing hasn't been tested, I'd see an audiologist.  I'd start there, then get on a list with a dev. ped possibly (wait lists are commonly very, very long!).

 

Yes, many kids have just a speech issue, but a bit of what you describe would make me want to have a more thorough evaluation to rule out some other concerns.

[Dory]

Both my boys have speech delays. My oldest has CAPD which they don't test for here until 8-9 and they didn't even mention to me when he was seeing a speech therapist during preschool. They just marked it down as everything else being fine (which at that point it still was). His speech has improved wonderfully at home.

 

My youngest really baffled them for awhile. His speech is beautifully articulate, but incredibly slow. They thought for a bit that he had receptive speech problems and then realized that it was more that he just wasn't paying attention. He came home after Kindergarten and I started noticing some fine motor problems with his writing. I worked with that for this past year and then I had a personal friend who is a speech pathologist mention fine motor problems and speech and it all clicked together. He is also gifted and that tends to help him compensate.

 

A therapist telling me that he is just quirky and will make up for his weaknesses with his strengths would have me livid. Quircky usually has a reason. Having kids compensate with their strengths lowers their overall abilities and lessons their ability to succeed at what they should truly be capable of. I agree with others saying you need more evaluation. Hearing should be checked as well just to rule those problems out. Your speech pathologist should have recommended that right from the get go. It usually is one of the first things they check. I have a feeling your first speech pathologist is about as clueless as our first was. They aren't all great at what they do.

[PeterPan]

My son was diagnosed with severe speech apraxia when he was 3. He had a huge vocabulary and no problem communicating with us, but his words were all jumbled up and we needed to translate for everyone else. He was already reading, and had enormous intense interests in other areas, and was advanced socially and academically from his peers (he had insisted on learning the alphabet before 2, for example). His certain Giftedness was not considered or looked at by the evaluator, and she did nothing to address him in a holistic manner. We felt very strongly that his speech issues were due to literally having more to say, more going on in his head, than he had the motor capability to get out at any time. We dropped the therapist and by the end of K, no one would have had any idea there had been an issue.

 

Now, he IS a host of quirks, and whether some are related to the supposed apraxia or not I'll never know, but in the end dropping the therapy was the right choice for him. Do your research and trust your mama intuition. I don't believe there's only one right path. :)

When therapists who don't do apraxia (as in don't specialize in it, don't know what they're doing) do that kind of mess, they do a disservice to the kids who actually HAVE the motor control problems of apraxia.  My boy is also very bright and constantly pushing his language, but his praxis (motor control) issue is totally obvious.  We spent 6 months picking up his jaw.  For two years now I have told him to pick up his tongue and round.  When a kid's speech just magically resolves given another year to bake, with no issues with word retrieval, motor planning, nothing, that was NOT apraxia.  I totally agree with your take that a very gifted dc would outspeak his developmental readiness, because my ds has constantly pushed that ceiling.  But for a therapist to call what your ds had SEVERE APRAXIA is the GROSSEST, most OFFENSIVE thing I can think of right now.  There actually ARE people with severe apraxia.  My ds' apraxia is moderate, and he's going to be in therapy for several more years.  All your ds had was a case of idiot therapist.  Severe apraxia?  Meet a teen who still can't talk, who's been working for 2 years with the best therapy available (PROMPT) who is just starting to get basic sentences.  

 

So that just makes me a little (again, no nice word) that a therapist would throw around that term so glibly when there are actually people with it, with serious problems, serious lifelong challenges.  

[MEmama]

Thanks for the reply, OhElizabeth. I agree! We couldn't stand her, she was totally single focused, had him "diagnosed" immediately, took no note of his other advancements, and asked us zero questions about his development. When I managed to get a moment with her and mentioned that BOTH grandfathers had needed their siblings to translate for the until age 5-6 so was there a possibility of it being genetic, she had the audacity to tell me she had NEVER, NOT ONCE heard of speech issues being genetic. Um yeah, we never went back!

[Annie G]

When therapists who don't do apraxia (as in don't specialize in it, don't know what they're doing) do that kind of mess, they do a disservice to the kids who actually HAVE the motor control problems of apraxia.  My boy is also very bright and constantly pushing his language, but his praxis (motor control) issue is totally obvious.  We spent 6 months picking up his jaw.  For two years now I have told him to pick up his tongue and round.  When a kid's speech just magically resolves given another year to bake, with no issues with word retrieval, motor planning, nothing, that was NOT apraxia.  I totally agree with your take that a very gifted dc would outspeak his developmental readiness, because my ds has constantly pushed that ceiling.  But for a therapist to call what your ds had SEVERE APRAXIA is the GROSSEST, most OFFENSIVE thing I can think of right now.  There actually ARE people with severe apraxia.  My ds' apraxia is moderate, and he's going to be in therapy for several more years.  All your ds had was a case of idiot therapist.  Severe apraxia?  Meet a teen who still can't talk, who's been working for 2 years with the best therapy available (PROMPT) who is just starting to get basic sentences.  

 

So that just makes me a little (again, no nice word) that a therapist would throw around that term so glibly when there are actually people with it, with serious problems, serious lifelong challenges.  

 

That's what made us so angry. Ds was diagnosed with 'severe apraxia' at age 2 1/2 by an EI team. It didn't make sense to us, but we allowed them to send a speech therapist to our home until he turned three and aged out of that program, then he went to the speech therapist they recommended. Both therapists declared they were well versed in apraxia and when we questioned the diagnosis, they both got very upset and basically said we were just parents and had no idea what we were talking about. 

 

The boy did not have apraxia.   Not even close.  He was just a late talker. And that made me so mad- how much time I spent worrying over that kid was bad enough, but how many other times did they mis the mark diagnosing other kids?  Y

 

Furthermore, if we had continued with the speech therapy, when ds finally started talking at age 4 3/4, in full sentences able to be understood by everyone, they would have touted him 'cured' of his apraxia, giving other parents the false hope that they could fix their kids' issues. 

[DawnM]

My middle son had speech issues.  He didn't talk until he was over age 3.  And then he hated talking because no one understood him.  

 

We just didn't do anything until he was about 1st grade.  He still had some speech impediments and we put him in speech therapy at our local Elem. school.   He liked her but she finally said he was a bit of a lost cause because he didn't care and to just give him more time.

 

He is 14 now and is fine, you would never know he had some serious speech delays when he was younger.

He has no other delays and gets good grades/scores on his schoolwork.

 

Dawn

[unsinkable]

All of my kids were speech delayed and got EI. They didnt really talk until they were over 3. Then they had articulation problems. They all three had almost constant fluid and infections in their ears. That was a HUUUUUUUUUUUGE part of it.

 

I know I was a late talker. I remember my mom said I barely said any words and my brother would talk for me. (He'd say, "the baby wants..." :lol: I just find that so cute now.)

 

I went birthday party with a bunch of kids after I turned three and my mom said the next morning I woke up and started talking in full sentences. She thought that I knew how to do it but something about the party just stimulated me.

 

So for my kids, I think it was combo of hearing problems and genetics from me.

[sbgrace]

I have one who had articulation issues only.

 

But I have another who had other things going on. I do think you have flags for other things going on, though it could be a number of other things. Who has evaluated and for what? I would look into further evaluation.

[EmilyGF]

My oldest son had huge speech delays and bizarre pronunciation when he finally began to start speaking. He began EI at 2.5 and continued, transitioning to a school speech therapist, at 5.5. He couldn't even say his sister's name, "Anna", correctly, until after age 6!

 

Now, he is bright, well-spoken, and has a huge vocabulary. 

 

Emily

[PeterPan]

Thanks for the reply, OhElizabeth. I agree! We couldn't stand her, she was totally single focused, had him "diagnosed" immediately, took no note of his other advancements, and asked us zero questions about his development. When I managed to get a moment with her and mentioned that BOTH grandfathers had needed their siblings to translate for the until age 5-6 so was there a possibility of it being genetic, she had the audacity to tell me she had NEVER, NOT ONCE heard of speech issues being genetic. Um yeah, we never went back!

Well since they have clear evidence of apraxia running in families (they've done the testing in England), she clearly wasn't up to date on anything.  

 

But seriously, it's totally possible for a bright kid to outstrip his development.  We struggle with this a lot with ds' therapy.  He'd want to say things and she'd basically have to pull back the therapy and say she couldn't do that, that it wasn't developmentally appropriate to push into those sounds.  

 

That's what made us so angry. Ds was diagnosed with 'severe apraxia' at age 2 1/2 by an EI team. It didn't make sense to us, but we allowed them to send a speech therapist to our home until he turned three and aged out of that program, then he went to the speech therapist they recommended. Both therapists declared they were well versed in apraxia and when we questioned the diagnosis, they both got very upset and basically said we were just parents and had no idea what we were talking about. 

 

The boy did not have apraxia.   Not even close.  He was just a late talker. And that made me so mad- how much time I spent worrying over that kid was bad enough, but how many other times did they mis the mark diagnosing other kids?  Y

 

Furthermore, if we had continued with the speech therapy, when ds finally started talking at age 4 3/4, in full sentences able to be understood by everyone, they would have touted him 'cured' of his apraxia, giving other parents the false hope that they could fix their kids' issues. 

Yours is not the only story I've heard like this. 

[LucyStoner]

I had a severe speech impairment as a child but no other disabilities or learning issues at all. I was the better part of 6 before my speech was understandable to people besides my immediate family. In fact my parents often needed my brother to translate what I was trying to say.

 

My niece has the same. She is actually quite gifted but has, like I was, been in speech therapy from age 5.