max has a speech therapy angel watching over him.

A year ago today, the world lost Kim Pace, one of the most special people I have ever met. I think about her every day, and I miss her terribly. Every time I drop Max off at therapy I see her photo on the wall, and I wish she was still here. She would be so proud of Max's progress. I know in my heart that she is watching over him and that he has his very own speech therapy angel helping him along. Over the past few weeks we have seen an explosion of language and I can't help but think that he may be getting a little extra nudge from Kim. I can see her now, a twinkle in her eye and her contagious smile as I tell her that yesterday Max asked his first spontaneous and unprompted question. He picked up a water bottle and asked "Is it empty?"and then turned it over and watched the little bit of water left trickle out. As I got a towel to clean up the water I responded "It is now!".

Last week at gymnastics, when asked by a coach he had never met where he wanted his stamp, he responded "My knee" and when I pulled into our driveway that night he commented "Aaaaaand we're home". The funniest comment he has made was at my friend Shannon's house when he ran up to the pool gate and hollered "Come on! The gate is locked!". I also enjoyed his observation after I primed the walls of our previously red dining room, "Wow, it's white". Not only is he a smart little fella, he has a very funny sense of humour. Kim always told me how smart and funny Max was. She saw his magic and helped me understand that with a lot of hard work and a strong belief in my son, I could help Max knock autism on its ass - that it autism wasn't a death sentence. So Kim, thank you for watching over my boy. I'm sending you light and love and please know that you will never, ever, be forgotten.

2 year anniversary of max starting to talk.

This post is dedicated to Kim Pace

Two years ago tomorrow, Max started talking. Up until that point, I really wasn't 100% convinced it would happen. I hoped and prayed that I would one day hear my son say "Mama" in his sweet little voice. On August 20, 2009, he did just that. I remember calling Scott on my way home and putting the phone up to Max's face so that Scott could hear him talk. Scott told me later that he sat and cried tears of relief at his computer after hearing Max say "Dada". It was a big day.

So we celebrate. We celebrate this milestone because it is important to remember how far Max has come. It is so important to stay positive and truly rejoice in Max's progress. This video was shot this morning. Max doesn't like having his picture taken so he did his best to avoid looking at the camera. It's still mind blowing though. Max - you are a rock star! Kim, you promised me he would talk, and check out our little guy now!




August 2010: One year anniversary of Max talking
August 2009: Yay!! Max is talking!

speech goals.

A few weeks ago, Max's Speech Therapist did a formal assessment of his language skills to update Max's speech goals.  We've noticed a big increase in his ability to use language functionally to request what he wants (and tell us what he DOESN'T want too).  What she was interested in was his social language skills, which is an entirely different skill set.  After her assessment, she sent home a list of goals for us all to work on so that we would be on the same page as her:

1. Max will understand and express the appropriate preposition (in, on, under, off and out) with 80% accuracy given minimal prompting.
2. Max will consistently label pictures with 80% accuracy given minimal prompting.
3. Max will receptively identify pictures from an array of 3-6 with 80% accuracy given minimal prompting.
4. Max will be exposed to a variety of theme based activities (variety of resources) to build on his vocabulary (ex. Colours, shapes household items, clothing, etc.).
5. Max will be able to identify body parts on himself, others and dolls/stuffed animals with 80% accuracy given minimal prompting.
6. Max will be able to identify receptively and express genders (boy/girl) with 80% accuracy given minimal prompting.
7. Max will identify (receptively) familiar verbs in a variety of resources with 80% accuracy given minimal prompting.
8. Max will demonstrate an understanding of basic concepts such as "big" and "little" with 80% accuracy given minimal prompting.
9. Max will be able to follow directions receptively when the speaker uses a variety of language such as "Show me", "Give me", "Pass me", etc. with 80% accuracy given minimal prompting.
10. Max will be able to answer "what" and "where" questions with 80% accuracy given minimal prompting.

When I go back and look at pictures of Max in his first speech therapy sessions, where he had no words, was unable to enter the therapy room without having a major meltdown, could not sit for any length of time, and screamed for the majority of the session, it reminds me that while his progress may be slow, he is most definitely progressing.  If you had told me back then that in less than 2 years Max would be working on prepositions, verbs and adjectives I would have laughed and said "yeah right".  But here we are.  The work is hard but it is fruitful.  I'm so proud of my son.  He works incredibly hard every single day and he does it with a smile.  At 4 years old he has more figured out than a lot of us do.

Max Update: My Budding Horn Player.

One of the many challenges that we are working through with Max is not only a delay in his speech, but the fact that he has trouble pronouncing a lot of consonants. Letters like B, M, P, K, G and many others are very difficult for him to say. I have a feeling he is much more advanced in his communication than we understand, because, well, we don't understand him. Max receives Speech Language Therapy twice a week, and also participates in a weekly Music & Language group. His speech goals are also incorporated into his Behaviour Therapy and his Occupational Therapy. Because of this he is making progress in leaps and bounds. We are finding that when he is communicating successfully, his acting out almost completely disappears. Makes sense, right? If he is able to articulate his needs and we are able to help him achieve what he wants, he is much happier. I completely get it (I tend to behave poorly when I don't get what I want too).

In this video (taped today), Max is not only blowing on a horn with long, full blows, he is using a straw, and blowing bubbles. You may recall, we started working on these goals last June. It took a while to get here (mostly because Max had trouble tolerating having anything touch his mouth, let alone be put in it). Success is indeed sweet. I am so incredibly proud of my Max. He blows me away with how hard he works and his beautiful smile is often what keeps me going. Yay Max! Next up - saxophone lessons?

Operation Suck It Up.

Max is on the cusp of a break through. We can all see it. Between the singing and increase in words, we are all waiting with baited breath for the next big thing. But how do we get there? What will be the key in pushing him over the top? While Scott and I have been scratching our heads, not quite sure what to do next, the members of Team Max are ready to rock and roll, with a slew of ideas on how to get our boy talking.

Last week, Max's Speech Therapist, Kim Pace, emailed the following message:

Hi Team Max! I am writing to let you know that over the course of the next 3 weeks, I have set the following goals for Max:

1. Move him off drinking from the sippy cup .... this is going to be a challenge, but is very important because sippy cups reinforce a tongue thrust/suckling type of swallow that we really need Max to move away from in order to move his oral motor skills for speech forward! I would like to see him drinking with a straw (a specific one of course....). That said, he was not happy about this little idea of mine today! He has significant oral sensitivity and we will need to address this first. No need to do anything directly with Max yet - just want you all to get ready and I will target next session and send out the next steps to everyone! You can, however, model by drinking from straws around him!

2. Establish some use of his lips so he'll produce more lip sounds. Right now, most of his sounds are made with his tongue. The only lip sound he has is "w". He approximates a /m/ but if you watch closely, it's not a strong /m/ - more like a nasal sound with his lips open slightly! Pretty tricky really! What can you do - Rob - heavy on the p/b/m sounds and words within music if you can. Model and practice Indian calls (i.e. tapping your mouth while you vocalize).

3. Eating - and chewing - yes, we'll be going there as well .... Katrina - can you email me Max's favourite foods that he eats with a spoon so I can plan for next session? Right now, he really avoids use of those lips while eating and chewing ....

I think that's it for now! Looking forward to a quick improvement in these skills - once he can use his lips better, it will add 3 more sounds to his repertoire which will really help us understand those words he's saying even more! Today, by the way - he sang "Old MacDonald" for me! It was great!

Take care and have a great week!

Kim

I would have never noticed that he doesn't use his lips, that this is why we aren't hearing certain consonants. Now that I am observing him more closely I can see what Kim means when she says he doesn't really use his lips. I've never had any luck getting Max to use a straw, so I was intrigued as to how Kim planned to transition Max from his beloved sippy cup to a straw.

The first step will be modeling using a straw. We bought a big box of straws and we are going to start using them in front of Max. Milk, water, beer, chardonnay, you name it, we're drinking it through a straw. Note to self - drink slowly!

We have also poked a really big hole in the sippy cup spout, so that Max will have to use his lips to control the flow. I got a dirty look from him this morning when he took his first slurp as if to say "hey….wait a second…something is DIFFERENT". He put it cup down, but did return later for some more milk.

The next step will be to put a straw in his cup, but cut it so that it only reaches the top of the spout, and doesn't poke out. After he is used to that, we will slowly make the straw longer and longer until it is sticking out of the spout and he has no choice but to suck on the straw.

Sounds so simple when I write about it…let's hope putting into play will be equally easy.