Ben's update

Well, we finally had Ben's evaluation with the speech therapist and occupational therapist yesterday. It was, well, trying ~ to say the least. I was more than a little sad by the time we left the evaluation. The bottom line is that Ben does qualify for the speech therapy and is, in fact, delayed in his speech. It's what we expected going in ~ but, it's still hard to hear it out loud and all laid out in front of me. I know we are doing the right thing with the early intervention, but it still makes me sad that Ben will have to work so hard to catch up. The good news is that we are confident that by his third birthday he will be caught up and will be right on track for his age.

These are the details for anyone that wasn't aware:
Ben has had multiple ear infections and sinus infection since he was eight months old. Last year we had tubes put in his ears and his adenoids removed (he had a 90% blockage ~ he could barely breath through his nose!) We seemed to be okay through the summer but then winter hit and he was again bombarded with infection after infection. His pediatrician advised us to remove him from daycare because his immune system wasn't able to recover after each infection and he was just more susceptible to another infection. So, as of April 1, I took a leave of absence from work and I have been home with him ever since ~ I must note that he hasn't had an infection since he's been home! His ears look healthy so we are not going to need another round of tubes (thank goodness!), but the damage is done and the ear infections caused Ben to develop mild hearing loss which, in turn, has caused his speech to be delayed ~ he just wasn't hearing the words correctly. The low down from the speech therapist is:

1. Ben will receive speech therapy with a speech therapist twice a month in our home. The therapist didn't feel that we needed to be as aggressive as once a week and that twice a month should do the trick.
2. Ben is in the 5th percentile for speech development ~ the normal range is 16 percentile - 75 percentile. We figure that Ben knows about 75-100 words ~ the bottom of the normal range for boys should be around 150 word...he's almost there, but not quite ~ girls have a higher number of words ~ but, we already knew girls talk a lot more :o) :o) :o)
3. Ben has poor muscle tone in his mouth and tongue. A contributing factor is the pacifier, which Ben still uses when he is sleeping ~ the speech therapist informed us that the pacifier must go immediately because it is training his tongue to stay in the down position which is contributing to the poor muscle development. The Binky went "bye-bye" last night ~ Ben did really well last night and today at nap without it!!! A small victory!!!!
4. We need to cut back on the background noise ~ T.V. should stay off as much as possible! Scott did not like this point :o) :o)
5. We need to do "mirror work" with Ben as much as possible ~ have him copy us making funny faces, sticking out our tongue, moving our tongue around in silly ways ~ this will help to build up his muscle tone in his face and tongue.
6. Ben should drink through a straw as much as possible and preferably thick liquids that would make him work at sucking it through the straw...did I hear milk shake, anyone!!!! Darn, I have to go to Dairy Queen because Ben needs therapy ~ HA HA HA HA HA :o) :o)
7. Ben's speech delay is a result of the hearing loss and poor muscle tone and does not appear to be cognitive or caused by some deeper learning disability ~ small victories!!! He understands speech and language ~ understands it, follows directions, etc. ~ he's just hearing the words muffled (like you have water in your ears) and can't repeat the sounds back correctly.
8. The occupational therapist does not see anything wrong with his motor skills or reasoning skills!! Yeah!

So, there it is. We will be doing speech therapy for as long as it takes to get him into the normal range for his age. We are working with a great program (Child Find and Developmental Pathways) through the school district and we are confident that he will "graduate" from the program in a relatively short amount of time!