Paul's Apraxia

I know I haven't put up pictures in awhile (I haven't taken ANY pictures since December) but I thought I would take the time to give an update on Paul's apraxia and how his speech is developing. When we started speech a year ago he only had three SOUNDS and no words. I still hoped that it would be a relatively easy fix and that after a few months of speech that he'd catch up. You hear so many stories about kids that are late to talk and do just fine. Well, we only had one speech session in March and then started again in April after we got back from a trip. After Cheri, his speech teacher, spent a few weeks with him she told me she thought he was a lot more severe than just a speech delay. She mentioned apraxia as a possibility. It was around the middle or end of April that she gave him a suspected dx of Childhood Apraxia of Speech (CAS). The more we've worked with him we've discovered that he not only has CAS but that he is severe. Speaking is extremely difficult for Paul and probably will be for a long time. We are really hopeful that he'll get to the point where he can speak normally but we probably won't know for sure until he's there. Along with speech there are some other areas in language (reading, writing, spelling, comprehension, overall language development, etc) that he may struggle with. Most of these we won't know until he's older and starts reading. So far we've been lucky in that he has had no other problems. Many kids with CAS have fine motor, oral, or sensory issues that they are dealing with.

With all that said, Paul has made great progress. It has defiantly not been easy for him or us, but we can see HUGE improvements. He now has more words than I can count. I lost track at 80 and he's continued to gain almost daily. I would say about 90% of the words that I understand can be understood by others in our family and about 75% can be understood by anyone who stops to listen. He has added a lot of new word shapes and can make most sounds that you encounter in English. He still really struggles with /s/ /v/ and /g/ but can get most others either as an initial or ending sound. Don't get me wrong, he's still way way behind his peers, but we are at a point where he is able to communicate and that is huge. There isn't a typical path of development for kids with apraxia so it's not like I can expect that at 3 he'll have hit this benchmark and at 4 he'll be here. That's what you learn to expect with your kids, you know about when they'll be able to do things. It's difficult not knowing what's ahead but in some ways it is really nice. I am able to just look at what he's doing and what gains he is making rather than worrying about whether they are enough. I do still worry though...all the time :)

We just has his IEP for preschool and it looks like he'll be getting two 30 min sessions a week at school. At least that's the hope. It's not enough so we are trying to figure out a private SLP for at least one more session a week. Hopefully insurance will cover it, but if not it'll be between $75-100 an hour. Can you believe it? We're just lucky we have gotten as much as we have up to this point.

We have really appreciated everyone's support and prayers this last year, I am not sure what we would have done without such wonderful family and friends.