Then and now

My head is spinning with things I need to do – I’ve fallen so behind in everything this month because of non-stop sickness in our house. We’re still in the midst of sickness and the prospect of catching up does not look good. I’m behind hours for work, our house is a mess, we need to cook meals/bake for the freezer, and the list goes on. I have way more things that I should be doing besides blogging…. but I want to share some great news.

You might remember not too long ago, when I was absolutely crushed after Maddy had her first speech and language assessment. Despite the fact that I had suspected Maddy’s language was delayed way back before she was a year old and she wasn’t babbling as much as I thought she should be, hearing just how delayed Maddy’s speech was, was a really hard pill to swallow.

Not too long after that day, Maddy had her first big assessment (VB-MAPP), which identified Maddy’s strengths, weaknesses, and her barriers to learning. Ultimately, it showed us incredible progress from when we first started behavioural therapy, but indicated that there was still a delay.

I took a few days to feel sad about Maddy’s two recent reports, and then we geared up to help Maddy move forward. Maddy has been doing 3 hours a week of ABA therapy, 1 hour a week of speech-language therapy, and a half hour a week of occupational therapy.

Every week Maddy’s speech-language pathologist, Sara, and I watched Maddy’s language skills grow. There were times when Maddy would do something during her session that I had never seen before, and I would be totally shocked and awed with her new skill. It has been a really amazing couple of months watching Maddy learn and grow.

I requested a report from our SLP that I could bring to our intake appointment with Thames Valley Children’s Centre (which is finally next week – yahooooo!). We just got it this week, and we’ve been bouncing off of the walls with excitement ever since.

The report indicates that Maddy is still delayed in her expressive and receptive language… but there is so much positive in the report that over-shines that fact.

I’m going to break this down really simply:

October 30th: Receptive language was at 3-6 month range

                       Expressive language was at 0-3 month range

Just typing that out makes me feel a lump in my throat again. For 16.5 months we were getting as much expressive communication from Maddy as you would get from a 3 month old…

December 5th: Receptive language 9-12 month range (and approaching 12-15 months)

                        Expressive language 9-12 month range (and approaching 12-15 months)

AMAZING!!!

We recognize how lucky we are to see this much progress so quickly, and my heart aches for families who might not be as fortunate, or who don’t have the opportunity to access the private therapy we’ve been able to access to reach this point. I can only hope that the public services start to catch up so other families can feel the excitement and joy we’ve been able to feel.

There is one part of the report that is my favourite,

Madeleine demonstrated excellent eye contact, joint attention, and social referencing skills. She smiled in response to preferred activities such as bubbles. Madeleine increased her play skills significantly since her initial evaluation; she consistently demonstrated constructive play and emerging pretend play skills.

This is such a contrast from the first report we received from our behavioural consultant.

I am so thankful for all of the hard work our therapists have done, and how much they’ve taught us so that we have been able to get Maddy to this point. Maddy has an incredible capacity to learn. As always, we’ll just keep our chins up, and enjoy today as much as we can, and patiently wait to see what Maddy’s future holds.

 

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