Childhood Apraxia of Speech
Anyone have any experience with it? Anyone's child have it? After MUCH research, I'm almost positive my son has a motor speech delay (@19 months) which falls under this category. We're in the middle of a series of assessments. I'm overwhelmed and would just like to reach out/touch base/discuss with any others who have some insight into this diagnosis. TIA!
My DD went through the assessment process for this. She didn't end up with the diagnosis, but she still has a lot of issues around speech. We started speech therapy with her at age 2, she is now 5 and still receving weekly therapy. I'm not seeing an end to that anytime soon.
Feel free to PM (or ask right in the thread!) if you'd like. I did a lot of research into the area too when it was a possibility for her.
yes my son does. recently reassessed, however Dx at around at age 2.
what's the prognosis? the best course of attack? i've gone to tyke talk they want to put DS in a “play with words“ program as they believe, that at 19 months, it's too young to have a real diagnosis. I'm seeing a private SLP for a second opinion. Should I be asking to see someone else or have certain tests done?
What were the signs your children were exhibiting at 18/19 months of age?
I have so many questions and am beyond overwhelmed ...
Thanks ladies!
Originally Posted by mum_of_four
My DD went through the assessment process for this. She didn't end up with the diagnosis, but she still has a lot of issues around speech. We started speech therapy with her at age 2, she is now 5 and still receving weekly therapy. I'm not seeing an end to that anytime soon.
Feel free to PM (or ask right in the thread!) if you'd like. I did a lot of research into the area too when it was a possibility for her.
Mum of Four ... what was the end diagnosis? What did they use to rule out Apraxia? Has she made progress over these 3 years? Where is she measuring at now? Sorry for all the q's .. I feel lost in a very big forest
for my son.. he was not speaking at all. (tongue tied as well). just imagine someone holding your tongue while you try to talk. thats how it was explained to us.. he was referred to TVCC. then sent on to Daycare for daily ST.. he also had his tongue 'untied' at age 2.. we were told he read lips from quite a young age. and blink and pointed to everything.. words were very garbled for ie. milk was 'gunk'.. then last summer(2009) his speech started to go downhill again.. i rarely understand what hes saying.. he's even started to stutter.. pauses ALOT between words to 'think' about what he's going to say.. or has trouble coming up with the right words.. many people have trouble understanding him. sometimes he says things backwards. we were also told by his ENT that the roof of his mouth is so highly and narrowly arched.. he will probably always have speech issues. however hes back in ST in highschool. it was also suggested he could use a microphone type machine in highschool. but he said no. he's having enough problems fitting in. he also has a severe healing loss in his left ear. unfortunately we don't have the funds to get hearing aids right now. anyway. im sure you'll get lots of help and advice from others as well.
I would say 19 months is pretty early. My kids were all late talkers, so with this DD (she was child number 3 for me) I didn't even take her to tykeTalk until she was past 2 and I realized she wasn't going to be like the others and just catch up. At 19 months she wasn't speaking at all.
I spent about 2 years with tykeTalk before the verbal apraxia was mentioned. We did all the therapy, and basically she wasn't progressing. Or progressing very very slowly. We were referred to a dev ped, DD wouldn't speak AT ALL while we saw him so very difficult for him to make a diagnosis. I think the main thing that they used to rule out apraxia was that she didn't have issues with eating. Does your DS? She has no “diagnosis“ at all, just a moderate to severe speech delay and likely a language delay but the speech needs to be improved before they can assess her for language.
We have been the private route also. Who are you seeing? I highly highly recommend Liz MacKinnon at Rejuvenate in Lambeth. That's who we went to after the dev ped, and in the “in between“ sessions of tykeTalk. She was awesome.
My DD has made progress but it is very very slow. We work on the same words week after week. There are certain sounds that she always has problems with, so when we introduce a new sound we have to make sure that the other problem sounds aren't in our practice words. So for instance, if there is a t and a k sound in the word, that's a problem. She has a lot of difficulty transitioning between sounds, at the moment in speech therapy we do individual words but if you start trying to put it into a sentence it is a whole other ball game, and she drops the ends of words because it is hard for her to manipulate her tongue.
I do see progress though! For a long time she wasn't able to say her own name (begins with F, she couldn't do F) but now if someone asks her name, she is able to say it. I can tell that she is really concentrating on getting the sound out, but the word comes out right. She didn't used to be able to say her sister's name (starts with K - a very hard sound for her) but now she can. We went through a stage where she would avoid other children because she was self-conscious, but she is over that now too.
What are the signs that make you think it's apraxia?
DS is 19 months with not a single “real“ word yet .. he's got an “EYE“ sound for Hi and says Mama but not in context. He otherwise only has a VERY SELECT few sounds like ma, mum, or mmm, na na na, ya ya, ba or bo, eye, a long 'a' sound, huh and hmmmm. Never has he combined any of these sounds and always repeats the same sound over and over when “babbling“ ... (i.e. he won't babble ma ma na ya ba, but instead ma ma ma ma ma ma ma ma with various tones)
He USE to be able to say DADA and who who but hasn't uttered those sounds in months.
He has no interest in attempting to make new sounds, immitate, or communicate.
He has pretty good receptive language, signs a handful of signs and uses points, grunts, and yes and no.
He has never been a big babbler and again .. only ever used the same repeated sound over and over when he did.
He has never had any problems with eating, sucking from a straw, nursing, etc.
It's the lack of sounds, babbles, and attempts that concern me (and the private speech path).
He's made very little gains in 10 months in terms of acquiring or attempting any new sounds (although he's come along quite normally for all other developmental milestones) and doesn't seem to build off anything he's learnt (and as mentioned above, has actually even lost sounds he once had).
We've reached a stage where he is very frustrated with me for not understanding him. Sometimes it appears as though he “thinks“ he is telling me what he wants (as though his 12 hmm's repeated over and over again are to him, coming out as though “I want a drink“ is what he's saying).
He completely shuts down anytime I try and initiate an imitation type activity or ask him questions such as “is this a p-p-pig?“
I know 19 months is early but for not a single word yet and so few sounds and no interest in attempting to talk?
Seems odd.
Well obviously I am no expert. I have had 4 late talkers, and not one of them was really talking at 18 months. And exactly like you say, with having a word and then seemingly not having it, etc. With mine, they didn't really catch on until after they were 2, closer to 2.5. Once they turned 2 I got them into nursery school (recommended by tykeTalk) and that seemed to help. With the first one I was freaked out, not so much by the fourth one!
The waitlists are horrendous. tykeTalk is pretty good, if you've been assessed, honestly I would do whatever it is they are recommending (I think you're talking about the group therapy sessions, I did those with both older and younger DS). Once you are in the tykeTalk system, you just roll along, you get therapy then you have a break, get reassessed, get therapy again. I would also keep up with the private therapy if you are able to. Everything helps, kwim?
With younger DS I did the tykeTalk group session and then we moved away so we are on the waiting list here now. In the meantime though he has suddenly decided to talk, and now he never.shuts.up.
My DD that I was talking about before is now in school and doing well. We do private speech therapy once a week. She is on the waiting list for CCAC and has been since July, but it looks like she won't receive any services from them until next year sometime, maybe in the summer.
he sounds exactly like my son and he as been there all the aeeements and they just figure he will talk when he wants to. he is now 2 and we have doen tyke talk and are waiting on further assesments as he didn't make and gains doing the play with words. I'm not worried. he has 3 words and uses sign to communicate. he never babbled as a baby and still doen'st really experament with any new sounds.
my cousin has aprexia diagnosed at 2 and after 2 years of speech thereay she started talking and hasn't stoped!!!!
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thanks for the encouragement! hoping this is our case!
how did they rule out that there wasn't anything “going on“ with your DS?
My DS is in daycare two days a week .. so far no gains.
Did the same symptoms my DS is exhibiting hold true with your 3 that were late talkers (but not diagnosed as delayed?). When do you truly feel there was a turn around where you “really“ knew it wasn't anything other than a stubborn late talker?
They think my DD might have some motor speech problems. She starts intervention with tyke TALK in the new year. She is 27 1/2 months and uses mostly /m/ sound and a few other sounds. has no /p/ /b/ /t/ /d/ sounds which are the early developing sounds. I don't really have much to offer in answers right now.
My DD uses alot of signs and gestures to get her message across to get her needs met most of the time. I can't wait until the day she can tell me what she did at daycare or talk about a toy she would like etc.
She is the only child in her daycare class of 10 who seems to be having difficulty communicating verbally. She is really trying to communicate verbally and repeat words they just all seem to sound the same.
Last edited by lhiannan; 12-03-2010 at 08:11 PM.
Don't worry yourself too much it sounds like you are doing the right things. Try to be positive and praise his attemptsDS is 19 months with not a single “real“ word yet .. he's got an “EYE“ sound for Hi --[COLOR=“Navy“]my DD does this too.[/COLOR]
It's the lack of sounds, babbles, and attempts that concern me (and the private speech path). [COLOR=“Navy“]--my DD was like this up until a few months ago....she refused to try and imitate or make any attempts....now she really tries to imitate but has difficulty making the sounds.[/COLOR]
We've reached a stage where he is very frustrated with me for not understanding him. Sometimes it appears as though he “thinks“ he is telling me what he wants (as though his 12 hmm's repeated over and over again are to him, coming out as though “I want a drink“ is what he's saying).
[COLOR=“Navy“]my DD does the same and we interpret for her and praise her for her attempts
[/COLOR]
He completely shuts down anytime I try and initiate an imitation type activity or ask him questions such as “is this a p-p-pig?“
[COLOR=“Navy“]MY DD was like that at your son's age--now she really tries to imitate now
[/COLOR]
[COLOR=“Navy“]I know 19 months is early but for not a single word yet and so few sounds and no interest in attempting to talk? “eye“ for Hi is a word! It is an approximation but it is a real word although not perfect....don't forget to count these as wordsmost kids don't say words perfectly when they first start, he is only 19 months and most kids at 19 months leave off the beginning or ends of words when they first start out.[/COLOR]
Seems odd.
Don't worry yourself too much it sounds like you are doing the right things. Try to be positive and praise his attempts
unfortunately he's not attempting very often
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