Any Speech-Apraxia parents out there?

[Lisa loves Pooh]

I was just wondering if there are others out there.

My son was diagnosed after 4 months of Speech. His language is coming in, but his speech much more slowly.

We've supplemented with ASL from Signing Times to provide him some vocabulary.

He is almost 2.5 and he sounds like about a 15-18 month old. He will finally attempt to copy sounds (except at the end of the day when he is just done and will respond uh-uh). He deletes the first sounds of every word. So the words he tries to say usually start with the final consonant. (How many words in the English language end in a "T"? That's Rocket from Little Einsteins btw).

I know many folks thing that it's just a boy thing and he'll grow out of it--which is reasonably true.

His speech therapists touches is face certain ways to help him figure out what his mouth should do for a sound. We also use Kauffman cards. He has come a long way--but still has a ways to go.

For words he just can't do--he will sign.

So are there any other parents out there with apraxic children?

 

[ProudMomTo3Boys]

My son is 4 1/2 and has been getting speech therapy since he was about 18 months old. He wasn't really saying anything at first. Once he started saying things he just wasn't making the correct sounds. He still sees a speech therapist in his pre school, state funded. There are still sounds that he just can't make, the f sound is a big one. He has improved alot since he started. I can understand him alot more because I am his mother. It takes time. My middle son was also in speech therapy until the 1st grade and he is 11 now and you would never know he ever had a problem.

 

[Lisa loves Pooh]

I have heard that when they can finally articulate, you would never know that there had been a problem.

What techniques have your speech therapist used with your children?

 

[peyjax]

I have heard that when they can finally articulate, you would never know that there had been a problem.

What techniques have your speech therapist used with your children?

Wow that is interesting. Everything that I read was that they typically deal with this for years if not life. How did you get him tested so young. My ds is older than yours and everyone (speech therapist, doctor, etc.) said to not test him until he was older that they really can not tell if it is Apraxia until they are an older 3 or 4 years old. I am wondering how they could diagnose that at 2? Not attacking just curious how they did that and how he was tested. Is he on target with everything else?

 

[mjkacmom]

My nephew (3) has it, and I see improvement. I can understand what he is saying about 1/2 of the time, with hand movements, but that was after I spend a week at their house. My sister has researched it, and although it can be a long, slow path, she's pretty confident to get him into a regular classroom by first grade. He gets ST twice a week at home, and is in a mixed class of regular kids and special ed. A neighbor's ds also mainstreamed into a regular class in first grade (special ed for kindy).

 

[Lisa loves Pooh]

Wow that is interesting. Everything that I read was that they typically deal with this for years if not life. How did you get him tested so young. My ds is older than yours and everyone (speech therapist, doctor, etc.) said to not test him until he was older that they really can not tell if it is Apraxia until they are an older 3 or 4 years old. I am wondering how they could diagnose that at 2? Not attacking just curious how they did that and how he was tested. Is he on target with everything else?

He has not been tested, but he demonstrates many signs.

He has no other delays.

He can't be tested b/c I believe the tests require more cognitive ability and he wouldn't be able to do them even if he could speak.

However his manner of speech is very abnormal. He still requires facial prompting for some sounds that he should have known a year ago and you can see him really working to produce a sound. Regular speech therapy was not working and until the methods to treat apraxic children were introduced, we had no progress at all.

 

[NewCrew42]

Just a hug!

My DD is dyslexic. I know these are different issues, but I just wanted to give you guys a hug!

 

[bzkds]

My son has verbal apraxia with motor planning disorder. He is just turning 11 now, and still has trouble with one certain "R" sound (the last sound children learn apparently, usually mastered by age 9). Some years teachers get all uptight about his speech, other years when I bring it up they act like they've never noticed. He had therapy for 3 years (ages 2-5) and has been reevaluated a couple of times throughout elementary school. Most of the time, his apraxia is no longer noticeable. The other kids don't seem to bother him about it much, although it does happen very occasionally (and usually by my older son or his friends.. all in college!)

My cousin's son also has verbal apraxia along with dyslexia. He had more therapy than my son went through and is now in 6th grade. Honestly, his dyslexia has caused much more trouble than the apraxia.

My friend's daughter is also apraxic and to a much more severe extent than my son. At age 10 now, she still frequently goes non-verbal when she is under stress and they did use sign language with her when she was younger. She didn't even begin speaking until after age 3. She also went to a special pre-school class for kids with speech problems. My own son we held back one year in preschool (and subsequently he started K at age 6) because the younger kids seemed to "go with" his unclear speech more easily.
Just to say.. there are many kids out there with all different extent of apraxia issues.

We do have an active Apraxia support group here (San Francisco Bay Area).

Beth

 

[coinkc]

My nephew was diagnosed with apraxia when had just turned 2. By age 3 he has already "graduated" from speech therapy and now at 3.5, he talks non-stop. PM me your email address if you want and I will pass it on to my sister. She did tons of research on it when he was diagnosed and even went to hear Nancy Kaufmann speak at a conference.

 

[ProudMomTo3Boys]

My middle son was in speech therapy because he had such terrible problems, so when my youngest was about 18 months old I didn't want to wait as long as I did with my middle, so I called my local county special services for early intervention and they came to the house and tested him. It really was that simple and they started services not that long after. Once he was in early intervention he just transferred into the pre school program in our town.

 

[kehlyrsmom]

My son (turning 8 on Sept 5) has been receiving speach servies since 18 months of age. He was diagnosed with apraxia speach and moderate autism. He did not say his for word until he was 4 (we were told that he would never talk) which he definately does but he is hard to understand especially if have never been around him before. He also receives OT as well as an eating thearpy since he is also a very picky eater. He is mainstreamed in school but does has a Teachers Aide that is with him all day.

 

[Lisa loves Pooh]

My son (turning 8 on Sept 5) has been receiving speach servies since 18 months of age. He was diagnosed with apraxia speach and moderate autism. He did not say his for word until he was 4 (we were told that he would never talk) which he definately does but he is hard to understand especially if have never been around him before. He also receives OT as well as an eating thearpy since he is also a very picky eater. He is mainstreamed in school but does has a Teachers Aide that is with him all day.

Can you tell me more about his picky eating and the eating therapy?

DS is picky--but I wouldn't know if he is "very picky" and if I'm just being "too" concerned in that area.

 

[locolala]

I'm not sure if what I had/have is speech apraxia, but I do know that I was almost completely nonverbal until I turned 3. I hardly even babbled! I was fortunate, my dad is a child psychologist and realized something was wrong when I wasn't verbalizing. They got me into speech therapy, where they began with teaching me sign. To this day I am almost fluent in sign, and often have trouble "spitting a word out" yet I can sign it! I still have some speech difficulties, I'll stutter or mix up a word. I don't know how describe the mixing up words.. it's almost like I'll switch sylables around or come up with something completely off the wall. I no longer get speech therapy, but my husband and dad will sometimes help me out on remembering to think through what I'm saying before I say it, if that makes any sense!

 

[pweyl36]

Wow that is interesting. Everything that I read was that they typically deal with this for years if not life. How did you get him tested so young. My ds is older than yours and everyone (speech therapist, doctor, etc.) said to not test him until he was older that they really can not tell if it is Apraxia until they are an older 3 or 4 years old. I am wondering how they could diagnose that at 2? Not attacking just curious how they did that and how he was tested. Is he on target with everything else?

My son was dx at 2 by a ped neurologist, then he start with speech therapy right after with the therapist coming to our house untill he was 3.Then he went to a public school 3 days a week with other children with the same problem until kindergarten. Then he would see the therapist at school. Now he talks like he never had a problem.

 

[sweetpeama]

My 6 yr old daughter has Apraxia in all 3 forms with speech being the worst. She also has Sensory Integration Disorder. She was officially diagnosed a little over 3 months before her 3rd birthday though it was suspected from the time she was turning 2 She is severe/profound on speech and uses sign language, pecs, and a communication device to communicate along with what limited speech that she does have. We are starting the process this month to see if we can find out the cause of her apraxia since some of them can have other health indications either for her in the future or the possibility of my almost 9 yr old daughter being a carrier. For information on the causes of apraxia for those with a child who has it I recommend the book Speaking of Apraxia a Parents Guide.

 

[disykat]

My son is 18 now and is on the other side of this, so I'll chime in.

He was pretty much non-verbal until about 2 1/2. He started speech therapy at about 2 years 3 months. We'd say "say mama," he'd try so hard and say "b b b bush!" He also had some muscle and tongue weakness that he was dealing with.

By the time he started 1st grade, his speech was pretty good as far as basic communication, but sometimes had issues with mumbling and a few letter sounds. He continued speech therapy off and on until the end of 5th grade.

Because of his muscle weakness, we worried when he chose the trombone as his instrument of choice at the beginning of 5th grade, but I think it was the best thing EVER for him. (He still plays and shows no sign of muscle weakness, just a little peek of a lopsided smile occasionally.)

His speech was pretty normal by about 6th grade, but he continued to have some organizational issues in his writing that I felt were somehow related. That had pretty much worked itself out by high school.

He ended up doing debate in high school and excelled at it. I was amazed that my non-verbal kid who only said "bush" whenever he tried to talk was doing debate. Now he's interested in law school. Go figure.

Anyway, I thought I'd share my story. All the kids I personally know with apraxia/dyspraxia of speech have similar stories. There's light at the end of the tunnel!

 

[TheIncredibles!]

Wow that is interesting. Everything that I read was that they typically deal with this for years if not life. How did you get him tested so young.

. My ds15 was completely non verbal until almost 4 years old. He was tested and diagnosed with Apraxia of Speech when he was 2 years, 3 months. It was a long road but now nobody would ever know unless they were a slp. He is still getting st because he does have trouble with long words with changing syllables like Mississippi. Unless he stops and slows down that will come out as missippippi or missississi

Every stage is a struggle. Getting more than one syllable, then more than one word, then full sentences when you get to the point where everything comes out and it comes out right it's amazing!!!

 

[ReneeA]

My DS started ST at 20 months due to the fact that he wasn't making any sounds...at all. He was officially diagnosed as apraxic at just over 3. He never cried as an infant, never made any attempt at vocalization until he was about 9 months old. At that point, he was only able to get a "dee" sound out, and that was an obviously forced noise. He was under a year when he came up with an elaborate hand signal system he used with immediate family. His speech finally came in just shy of his 4th birthday. He was in speech therapy 3x a week for a year, then started a program through the hospital that the therapy program was ran by. It replaced preschool for him...he went 3x a week, 3 hours a day, and it was framed like a preschool, only with speech, occupational, and physical therapists running it. He also had fine and gross motor skill delay, and some food aversions. Most of his food issues have to do with texture...for instance, he won't eat mashed potatoes but loves all other kinds of potatoes. Mushy foods still give him fits, and he's 12. He's otherwise an adventurous eater and loves just about anything you plop in front of him.

He was still seeing a speech therapist through his 5th grade year of school. They worked on fluency, multisyllabic words, and his pressured speech patterns. He's now in middle school, and doesn't require ST anymore. There are times I can see him struggle to get sounds out, and just tell him to take it slow and in steps like he was taught before. His gait and fine motor skills are still severely lacking. The poor kid has what looks like little muscle control in his arms and legs. He played football this year, and was *terrible*, but he loved it, and was great for strength training. So as long as he doesn't get picked on, and wants to continue, we'll encourage it. We've been trying to encourage strength training at home as well, but there's much more incentive when you've got 30 other kids to compete against in football practice.

Overall, you can't tell that he's got apraxia (at 12). I think the only reason for that has been early intervention and continuation for many, many years.