I had the privilege of holding a three week old little girl last night. As she snuggled in my arms I watched all of the fleeting facial expressions and listened to the grunts and snuffles and sighs. It was so sweet.
I don't remember my babies being so expressive so young. To be honest I don't remember them being so expressive even much older. Is it that I just don't remember? Is it that I was too sleep-deprived and stressed to notice? Or does the apraxia start to show so early if you know what to watch for? Do the problems with motor-planning show up even as tiny infants? Apraxia is neurological in origin. Presumably it is there from birth. How does it impact their infancy and our introduction to motherhood?
Monday, September 12, 2011
Sunday, September 11, 2011
Nine Months Ago
After listening to Ava sing the Itsy Bitsy Butterfly, I found myself trying hard to remember what she was like before.
At 21 months of age, you want most typically developing children to have a spoken vocabulary of at least 10-24 words. By 24 months of age you want to see 50 spoken words and some two-word combinations. You also expect those words to contain almost all vowel sounds and a wide variety of consonants. You would expect a typical history of cooing, laughing, smiling, and babbling as an infant.
Ava did not have a typical history of cooing, laughing, smiling, and babbling as an infant. At 21 months she used no more than 4 different vowel sounds and 3-4 consonant sounds. Her spoken vocabulary at that time is well represented in this video I took one day (11-30-2010 to be exact) while we were reading a story before bed. She had about three words: "de" (that or there), "uh" (used in a variety of ways for emphasis), and "oh no".
I remember taking this video. It was after I had finally accepted that there was a problem and I needed to pursue getting Ava evaluated. I took the video thinking it might be helpful to show it to someone because I knew she often wouldn't "talk" at all in front of strangers. As it turned out, I never used the video for that purpose, but I wanted to share it now. It is a good representation of what Ava's expressive language looked like before we started intervention.
Ava - 21 months old - Childhood Apraxia of Speech before therapy
At 21 months of age, you want most typically developing children to have a spoken vocabulary of at least 10-24 words. By 24 months of age you want to see 50 spoken words and some two-word combinations. You also expect those words to contain almost all vowel sounds and a wide variety of consonants. You would expect a typical history of cooing, laughing, smiling, and babbling as an infant.
Ava did not have a typical history of cooing, laughing, smiling, and babbling as an infant. At 21 months she used no more than 4 different vowel sounds and 3-4 consonant sounds. Her spoken vocabulary at that time is well represented in this video I took one day (11-30-2010 to be exact) while we were reading a story before bed. She had about three words: "de" (that or there), "uh" (used in a variety of ways for emphasis), and "oh no".
I remember taking this video. It was after I had finally accepted that there was a problem and I needed to pursue getting Ava evaluated. I took the video thinking it might be helpful to show it to someone because I knew she often wouldn't "talk" at all in front of strangers. As it turned out, I never used the video for that purpose, but I wanted to share it now. It is a good representation of what Ava's expressive language looked like before we started intervention.
Saturday, September 10, 2011
Who wins?
She wins
I knew it was too quiet...
I win
Finally, I get something in the girl's hair! And she's happy about it. And she wears it to school!
I knew it was too quiet...
I win
Finally, I get something in the girl's hair! And she's happy about it. And she wears it to school!
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