Today’s Guest Post is from Emily over at Insanity Rules please head over and follow her lovely blog to continue following her story.

Morning y’all! It’s another gorgeous summer day around here but that’s not really what’s on my mind today. You see I am the mom of four little boys and with that comes challenges, joy, and mischief. Now each child learns differently and no two kids are a like. My first two were so different. Night and day when it came to talking, walking, crawling, potty training, and all that jazz. So, you know I expected baby number three our Littleman to follow along with one of them but of course he had is own path to forge. He’s actually a bit like both of them and yet totally different. 

He’s a bit of a goof if you can’t tell. A true cutie with these dimples that you just can’t resist. It wasn’t until he was two that I started to notice he wasn’t talking like other kids. Oh he talked alright we couldn’t get him to stop but it was just babble. It didn’t sound like anything and he was using the same word for everything. It was really apparent when we would go to church and all the other nursery kids even kids younger then him were using words like thanks, hello, bye and stuff like that. Littleman wasn’t saying any of that. It was just Dano for everything. Even the child who had started out by saying Mama didn’t say that any more. Called everybody Daddy. He’d even said Batman clearly for about a week and now it was just a jumble of words. Okay I’m owning up to the fact that I’m a bit of a worrier and to say that I was worried was probably putting it mildly. I was terrified that there was something seriously wrong as I felt like he was dropping words instead of gaining them. 
So, I sought out some advice from other moms and most of them said I should have him tested. Now no one likes to think there is something wrong with their babies. Trust me I had all those thoughts of what did I do wrong, didn’t I talk to him enough, did we encourage him to babble etc…. Ladies that’s all normal but really it’s not as uncommon as you think. A friend suggested that we take him to ECI ( Early Childhood Intervention ). So, I spoke with his pediatrician who also was concerned that he wasn’t saying anything that made sense and wrote us a recommendation to get him evaluated. So, I called the people at ECI and set up an appointment. Now I’m going to say that my hubs thought I was totally over reacting. He just thought he was a little behind and he would be fine. So, I actually ended up cancelling our first appointment thinking okay he’s getting a little better. Saying a few more things maybe I am just over reacting. It was my mom who told me to just get him evaluated it wouldn’t hurt. I had major anxiety that it was going to be some huge ordeal and they were going to tell me something was terribly wrong with our little man. Yep I totally jump to conclusions. 

Let me tell y’all that getting him evaluated really wasn’t as big a deal as I was worried it was going to be. It was about an hour and a half to two hours where they asked him to do things, asked questions, and let him play to show them what he knew. He did qualify for speech therapy and has an awesome therapist who comes to our house once a week to play and teach him new words etc… Littleman is doing awesome! Our little guy is now saying full sentences, running around telling me what things are, and copying things that his older brothers say. Yes he still uses Jargon as his speech therapist calls it but we can understand him and so can other people! Which is a huge mile stone for him as before no one knew what he was saying. Therapy has been so worth it for us and you know as stressed and worried as I was about the whole thing it turned out to be the best thing for him. Now when people ask us how he’s doing and about speech therapy it’s not so hard to talk about. I would recommend it to anyone who’s child seems to be struggling to talk.

Communication is how this world runs and they need to be able to communicate on their own. I will always be grateful that we went ahead and did this. He is still working weekly to get better and loves when he says something and we all smile and clap. It motivates him to keep on talking. He is being evaluated by our school district in case he needs further help when he turns three. As ECI only takes them until they are three. I hope in some way our story will help others. Trust me I’m a true worrier and over thinker on matters that come to my kids! Trust your gut your their parent and have a wonderful day y’all!
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