Leigh
07-05-2006, 08:55 PM
Today we went in for our final Hanen appointment. I was under the impression that it was a taping again but instead I got our tape back. Anyway, it was all about discussing the program and seeing if I had any questions about it all.
Overall, I have to highly reccommend the program. It was incredibly well thought out and makes sense. Although I have been through speech and language with my eldest son who suffered a severe delay as well, he was caught at a later age and I did not get as much background information as I did with this program. This has made me stop and think about almost everything I say and do with Iain, but also has empowered me to use theory and tricks to engage him.
Today we talked about the benefit of the program and I would have to say it was my empowerment and it has helped with frustration levels for Mr. Iain, although not so much today.. more about that later. I am taking it slow and we are now in the "off block" and will not return for assessment until November or December. That is really far too long and I will see if I can scrape up for some private therapy in the meanwhile, although our SLP thinks it is a great idea to get private yet he needs us to go slow and using our Hanen skills may just be fine for now. It is pretty much a foregone conclusion he will continue in speech come the next block unless some big miracle occurs.
We are to focus on about 5 to 10 words (combination of learned words and new words) and do them for one week solid and then switch to another block of words for one week and then return back to the original block again. He is not consistant with his words at all but today she heard pretty much all his repetoire in our session. Again, I hear 5 to 10 words are being used. Again, I argue that saying three words in a group like "Moooo-oh juuuuusss, peeeeaaaaaaassssssssss" (more juice please) counts as three but she says he may just be learning in chunks now and to treat it like one word. Same for "I ya u" (I love you, which I have not heard since the last time I posted, by the way) and his latest aquisition of "let's go". I sort of get what she is saying but I still think of all that as 8 words all told, not 3, you know?! He is indeed inconsitent with his words and maybe he is not on speech strike when he does not talk for a week at a time, I do not know. The idea is to give him more of a base of words to build upon and I understand that completely. Give him the skills to build on.
This morning Iain was in a GREAT mood. Then I picked him up and the second we hit CHEO and were in the entry way he saw about 20 people in the waiting area lobby and freaked. We got by them and I bought some pizza (today's idea for our session was to have a picnic and have him use his words during it for observation. All he did was chew and spit out the pizza. Great. He did however chow on crackers and fruit roll ups so it was not all lost.) as he never gets pizza at home due to Curran's allergies. He started to scream in the cafeteria. And down the hall. A clown approached us and tried to give my screaming child a sticker and that sent him up to shrieking. We continued down the hall and arrived at reception where I shouted out our appointment. We entered the waiting area which is filled with toys and unfortunately people and now the shrieking one would have thought could not get any worse increased to ear splitting. I could not get him to calm down and as I could not lock in on a problem I took him out of the stroller, went through all sorts of checks on him and was left with "this is behavioural" so I left him to scream it out. Other parents said "been there, done that" and "he is soon going to be 2 years old, right?" so I was amongst friends. Along came a worker who kicked me out of the play area within 5 minutes and put us in a private room instead. Never, ever have I been kicked out of a room with him before! In retrospect I think it is hilarious but at the time I did not. Once in the room he just begged for rubs. He lives for sensory rubs, as in he always wants his hands, back, legs, tummy stroked forever. He calmed down until the woman who put us there came in with a glass of water "in case he needed it". Yeah, I sure would not want his mouth to get dry from all that shrieking....
Finally it was time for our meeting and he was pretty good to get there but had several screaming moments in the room. He talked a lot in my opinion and our SLP seemed impressed that he was engaging so well as in the past he has just done his own thing or ran for the door to get out. He did not engage with her at all this time, but I think he was cranky from all the crying. We had our talk about everything and up came his sensory issues. I know he has them, she knows he has them. Due to his severe food aversion for so long, his continuing battle with food, his severe speech and language delay coupled with the fact that in our 45 minute session he had me stroking him for over half of that made her have me sign off on agreeing to a child development screening to be done within the next 3 months. As she said, it will be helpful to know what we are dealing with. I agree but as I have heard autism and aspergers in the past and dispute it I am left with her comment that there is a whole range of things to consider and if we catch it now we can tailor his therapy accordingly. He does have many social problems yet and I have always put them down to speech related. Anyway, I am not going to worry for now as I heard all this with Walker (who actually did fit the bill for some problems, especially with his total lack of eye contact and obsession for lining things up) and Walker is fine. I know Iain is not Walker but I do not think he has any problem other than a big sensory intergration one.
Sorry this is so very long and jumbled. At some point when I get a chance I should post about the Hanen program again as it was really very good to attend. My questions were always a bit more unique and we are the only ones to use sign (which we are to continue with) but the SLPs who conducted the program were spectacular and I did learn so very much. Even though we are struggling yet with his speech and frustration levels I know I have the tools to help him once he has a speech spurt. It would be great to know why he is so very inconsistant with his speech.
Overall, I have to highly reccommend the program. It was incredibly well thought out and makes sense. Although I have been through speech and language with my eldest son who suffered a severe delay as well, he was caught at a later age and I did not get as much background information as I did with this program. This has made me stop and think about almost everything I say and do with Iain, but also has empowered me to use theory and tricks to engage him.
Today we talked about the benefit of the program and I would have to say it was my empowerment and it has helped with frustration levels for Mr. Iain, although not so much today.. more about that later. I am taking it slow and we are now in the "off block" and will not return for assessment until November or December. That is really far too long and I will see if I can scrape up for some private therapy in the meanwhile, although our SLP thinks it is a great idea to get private yet he needs us to go slow and using our Hanen skills may just be fine for now. It is pretty much a foregone conclusion he will continue in speech come the next block unless some big miracle occurs.
We are to focus on about 5 to 10 words (combination of learned words and new words) and do them for one week solid and then switch to another block of words for one week and then return back to the original block again. He is not consistant with his words at all but today she heard pretty much all his repetoire in our session. Again, I hear 5 to 10 words are being used. Again, I argue that saying three words in a group like "Moooo-oh juuuuusss, peeeeaaaaaaassssssssss" (more juice please) counts as three but she says he may just be learning in chunks now and to treat it like one word. Same for "I ya u" (I love you, which I have not heard since the last time I posted, by the way) and his latest aquisition of "let's go". I sort of get what she is saying but I still think of all that as 8 words all told, not 3, you know?! He is indeed inconsitent with his words and maybe he is not on speech strike when he does not talk for a week at a time, I do not know. The idea is to give him more of a base of words to build upon and I understand that completely. Give him the skills to build on.
This morning Iain was in a GREAT mood. Then I picked him up and the second we hit CHEO and were in the entry way he saw about 20 people in the waiting area lobby and freaked. We got by them and I bought some pizza (today's idea for our session was to have a picnic and have him use his words during it for observation. All he did was chew and spit out the pizza. Great. He did however chow on crackers and fruit roll ups so it was not all lost.) as he never gets pizza at home due to Curran's allergies. He started to scream in the cafeteria. And down the hall. A clown approached us and tried to give my screaming child a sticker and that sent him up to shrieking. We continued down the hall and arrived at reception where I shouted out our appointment. We entered the waiting area which is filled with toys and unfortunately people and now the shrieking one would have thought could not get any worse increased to ear splitting. I could not get him to calm down and as I could not lock in on a problem I took him out of the stroller, went through all sorts of checks on him and was left with "this is behavioural" so I left him to scream it out. Other parents said "been there, done that" and "he is soon going to be 2 years old, right?" so I was amongst friends. Along came a worker who kicked me out of the play area within 5 minutes and put us in a private room instead. Never, ever have I been kicked out of a room with him before! In retrospect I think it is hilarious but at the time I did not. Once in the room he just begged for rubs. He lives for sensory rubs, as in he always wants his hands, back, legs, tummy stroked forever. He calmed down until the woman who put us there came in with a glass of water "in case he needed it". Yeah, I sure would not want his mouth to get dry from all that shrieking....
Finally it was time for our meeting and he was pretty good to get there but had several screaming moments in the room. He talked a lot in my opinion and our SLP seemed impressed that he was engaging so well as in the past he has just done his own thing or ran for the door to get out. He did not engage with her at all this time, but I think he was cranky from all the crying. We had our talk about everything and up came his sensory issues. I know he has them, she knows he has them. Due to his severe food aversion for so long, his continuing battle with food, his severe speech and language delay coupled with the fact that in our 45 minute session he had me stroking him for over half of that made her have me sign off on agreeing to a child development screening to be done within the next 3 months. As she said, it will be helpful to know what we are dealing with. I agree but as I have heard autism and aspergers in the past and dispute it I am left with her comment that there is a whole range of things to consider and if we catch it now we can tailor his therapy accordingly. He does have many social problems yet and I have always put them down to speech related. Anyway, I am not going to worry for now as I heard all this with Walker (who actually did fit the bill for some problems, especially with his total lack of eye contact and obsession for lining things up) and Walker is fine. I know Iain is not Walker but I do not think he has any problem other than a big sensory intergration one.
Sorry this is so very long and jumbled. At some point when I get a chance I should post about the Hanen program again as it was really very good to attend. My questions were always a bit more unique and we are the only ones to use sign (which we are to continue with) but the SLPs who conducted the program were spectacular and I did learn so very much. Even though we are struggling yet with his speech and frustration levels I know I have the tools to help him once he has a speech spurt. It would be great to know why he is so very inconsistant with his speech.