SLP Mommy of Apraxia

Tag: Beating apraxia

  • You play dirt with me?

    You play dirt with me?

    We took our annual Fourth of July camping trip to Glendo State Reservoir in Wyoming.   It’s a family tradition, so I decided to document her progress each year.  Last year’s experience can be found here: Glendo 2013
    This was only a few short days after our near drowning incident at her pool during swimming lessons.

    Glendo is a HUGE reservoir, and a lot of our time involves the beach.  I was worried about Ashlynn’s safety, and also if she would be too scared to go in the water.  The first day she kept her distance from the shoreline; however, the second day she walked to the shoreline and was watching her dad who was floating in the water maybe 10 feet away. Sensing she wanted to come in, he held out his arms.  I didn’t see him at first and my sister motioned to me that it looked like she was going to go in.  I went running to her, but stopped just short behind her.

    I saw my husband with arms outstretched encouraging her to come to him, and then I saw her little shoulders rise up big as she took a deep breath, and she marched in the water.  She marched through the waves, keeping her balance, until she fell into his arms with a big smile upon her face.  He hoisted her up into a floaty with him to enjoy floating in the water under the warm sunshine.

    I looked on in awe.  She’s so brave.  Her character is quite astounding to me, and I’m her mother.  She faces challenges, fears, and obstacles head on.  She never gives up. She is determined and resilient.

    She also of course, rode our jet ski.  I wrote last year that she asked, “Ashlylnn play boats with daddy?” and this year, she announced proudly after riding, “I ride the je-si huh!”

    One of her favorite requests this year was, “you play dirt with me?”  imploring anyone who would listen to play in the sand with her.  No one had the heart to say no, so she made quite a few friends and suckered in quite a few family members!

    When it was time for fireworks, Ashlynn has historically stayed in the car.  However, this year, she again put on a brave face and ended up enjoying the show!  At times she would say, “that was too close!!!” but she never went back in the truck.

    I like documenting some of her milestones on the Fourth of July, Independence Day.  It’s so fitting since each year she becomes more and more independent.

  • Ashlynn summer speech therapy 3.9 years

    Ashlynn summer speech therapy 3.9 years

    Ashlynn received two grants to help with her speech and occupational therapy over the summer!  The United Health Care Foundation and the Lindsay Foundation made it possible!  I am so grateful.  Ashlynn will be back to getting intensive 1:1 speech and OT services.  

    As far as speech goes, Ashlynn communicates her wants and needs.  She has basic conversational skills and really does try to tell us what happened in her day.  Sometimes when she’s talking, I see my husband look at her with pride in his eye and I know what he’s thinking.   Even though we don’t always understand what she is saying, it is amazing to listen to her talk and try to tell us things.  She was silent for so long.  
    I love her speech therapist.  She was actually my mentor and is now one of my good friends.  She’s fun, but I also know she’ll push her.  However, I also know she’ll find the deficits and the continued deficits are hard to be faced with and make me sad.  I want to write it down though, because if I know anything about Ashlynn, I know she’ll overcome it.
    – She has significant word finding issues.  Sometimes, she needs so much wait time that eventually she even forgets what she wanted to say and moves onto something else.  
    – Her attention continues to negatively impact her progress
    – When something is hard, she changes the subject and tries to talk about something else
    – Auditory processing skills such as auditory discrimination between minimal pairs (sleep, seep) appear to be impacted.  
    – Grammar, including marking varying tenses and using s/v agreement along with pronoun usage are faulty
    – Syntax is jumbled, particularly for question forms
    – Still has a tendency to assimilate sounds she knows how to say (goggy/doggy), and continues to be inconsistent with her production of consonants in her repertoire (koys/toys). 
    – Needs continued work with /l/ and /r/
    – Continues to breakdown with novel multi-syllabic words
    – Receptive language skills continue to need monitoring
    That’s a long list, but I have to remind myself it used to be longer.  She’ll get there.  I know it.  There was a time I worried if she would ever make friends because she couldn’t talk to them.  Here she is at the splash park talking to perfect strangers and making friends.  One step at a time.
  • For once I went to school, and I heard only positives

    For once I went to school, and I heard only positives

    Let’s face it.  Being a parent is rough.  Whether you have a child with special needs or not, we all want for their happiness, that they will feel successful, that they will be confident, and that they will never hurt.  Of course we know that without trials they cannot fully appreciate the successes, without sadness they could never fully experience complete happiness, without hurt they simply wouldn’t be human. 

    School has been an absolute blessing for Ashlynn, my social butterfly.  She never let her limited speech hinder any of her relationships.  In fact, her first word was ‘hi’ and it was all she needed.  She could and still can engage anyone with that simple word and her beautiful smile, and they are hooked. 

    But

    That’s why it was so hard to go to IEP meetings, parent teacher conferences, and get reports from her teachers and therapists.  No matter how many positives were relayed, we always sit there waiting for the

    But.

    She is so happy and works so hard,

    But

    She is friendly, sociable, and loving

    But

    She is an absolute joy

    But

    I’m not gonna lie.  The “buts” hurt.  It really doesn’t matter if they are framed around 100 glowing adjectives, the “buts” can be overwhelming.  Especially when for one child she needs a

    speech therapist
    occupational therapist
    physical therapist
    special education teacher
    social worker

    They all come with their own set of “buts.” 

    Today though was different!!  Today, her last day of Pre-K, there were no “buts.”  Today, as I picked her up, I heard this:

    Teacher: “I have been blessed having Ashlynn is my class.”
    Social Worker: “Ashlynn is the sweetest, kindest child. She is friends with everyone, and everyone is friends with her.”
    Another parent: “My son told me this morning he was really going to miss Ashlynn. When I asked him what he would miss, he told me her laugh.”

    It just brings tears to my eyes. There’s no standard score or percentile for that….but if there were she would be way above average. 
      
    Ashlynn is my sweet, kind, loving, daughter who blesses those around her with her smile, her laugh, and her friendship.

    No buts about it.


  • Her first “favorite”

    Her first “favorite”

    Kids always seem to have a favorite flavor of the week. Parents probably promote this. What is your favorite color? What was your favorite animal at the zoo? What was your favorite candy you received on Halloween? What is your favorite TV show, movie, toy, food, dessert etc etc. if Ashlynn has ever been partial to anything, we have never known, until last weekend.

    We went on a mini vacation basically planned around kid activities. Who knew that becoming a parent would also drastically change your idea of a dream vacation! We went down to our favorite Embassy Suites. There is a separation of the living room and bedroom so we can put our kids to bed and still have some quality time together, free happy hour for the parents, and free hot buffet breakfast for picky kids who have their choice of anything and everything to eat at no cost to us!

    A pool for free swimming and hot tubbing is a bonus, and it’s next to a bunch of family friendly places, like the Cheyenne mtn zoo. Oh, and it’s also next to kid friendly restaurants like Old Chicago and TGI Fridays.

    Coming back from the zoo my husband and I were full of “favorite” questions. “What was your favorite animal Ashlynn?” “Did you have fun?” “What was your favorite part?” She didn’t really answer. As we got closer to the hotel, she inquired, “Where we goin?” We answered back to the hotel….and that’s when we heard it. We heard her first favorite anything in that moment when she was 4.3.

    “Yes? That hotel’s my favorite!”

    My husband laughed and verified, “That hotel’s your favorite?”

    “Yeah!” she replied.

    He turned to me and said aloud what I was already thinking, “That was the first time she’s ever said anything was her favorite!”

    I don’t think many parents with of typically developing kiddos remember what they said was their first favorite. I don’t know my 19 month old sons yet, but I also am confident I won’t be waiting two more years to hear his favorite anything. With Ashlynn though, we just have always wanted to know her thoughts, her dreams, her fears, her favorites! We knew she liked that hotel as she has been to it at least four times prior, but hearing it was her favorite was just something special that’s hard to describe. It’s like we finally get to HEAR these things in her own words, and not just from her smile.