Failure

This morning I met with the speech therapist at Justin's school. Long story short J's language development is the equivalent of a 21 month old; J is 41 months so that's about a 1 1/2 year delay, OUCH!!! I couldn't help but feel like a complete failure after hearing that. Especially considering J had a speech evaluation last year which put him at about the same delay. Perhaps I was in denial a year ago; after all the therapists only have one 30-45 minute session to evaluate him and in both cases J didn't do half of the stuff we know he can do. And after last year's evaluation I discussed the results with J's Early Intervention teacher who works with him weekly and she didn't feel that his delay was that severe. Between her weekly sessions and us working with him regularly at home we didn't feel the need to rush to therapy but now I'm second guessing that decision. I know I shouldn't compare but I look at other preemies, all born around the same gestational age as J, whose language has just really taken off and I can't help but wonder what I did wrong.

But after talking to Carl and a couple of friends I've realized I can't let this get me down. On the bright side J's expressive language (use of words and sentences to communicate thoughts, needs or wants) is only slightly below average. It's his comprehensive/receptive language (process of understanding what is said) that really brought his score down so we discussed her goals for him. Two of them are things that J is already doing but he didn't show during his evaluation so the therapist said she will adjust the goals accordingly once they get into their sessions. One of them was something Carl and I had already identified so at least we're on the same page there. The last two were things that I've actually never considered or thought about but now realize are key to his development so I'm glad she'll be working with J on them. She gave suggestions on things for us to do at home, some of which we're already doing so we just need to continue with what we've been doing even though it doesn't seem like it's helping. The therapist will provide weekly updates on what they worked on during the week so we can reinforce things at home. So we have a plan; the hope is that we'll see significant improvement by the end of the school year.

On another note, I finally got a chance to see J with his classmates while I waited for the speech therapist. Since there are some kids that get dropped off and others that ride the bus the preschool kids wait in the hallway with the teacher and her aide to give everyone enough time to get in the building and to let the older kids get into class. Once everyone is rounded up they walk in a line (follow the blue line on the floor) to the classroom. Justin was 2nd in line and walked to class on his own; his teacher was at the middle of the line and the aide was at the back. It's so simple but I was so proud seeing him walk to class.

After the meeting I peeked into the classroom; they were wrapping up breakfast and most of the kids were still at the table eating while a few kids sat on the floor reading. Even though the door was open I couldn't see J but I didn't want to just walk into the classroom and disrupt things. But the aide saw me and told me to go ahead and peak my head around the corner since J was off to the side where I couldn't see him. He was sitting, well more like hanging off the chair with a spoon in his mouth and he saw me but he didn't smile, cry, get up, nothing so I just turned around and left. I didn't see much but it was nice to see nonetheless since we don't get the opportunity to observe or participate in classroom activities.