ANY ADVICE?? 22 month daughter's speech is awful!!!

[SmileyLinda]

Good morning folks. I'm getting really concerned about my little munchkin. Her talking is not good. Her vocabulary so far is - Mum, dad, up, down, NO! That's about the extent of it. She's very clever otherwise, you can ask her to bring down a red and blue pair of socks from upstairs and she can do it, but she just won't talk. She won't even mimic! Me and her daddy talk to her all the time, and we always have, but still nothing.
When we go to toddler group, all the kids are yabbling away and Carrie's just standing in amongst them in silence!
Please, folks, any advice would be welcomely recieved xxx

SmileyLinda

God you sound like me - I just wanted someone to tell me if he was average, struggling, hearing impaired, ASD, what - seriously WHAT !
I think you have a good plan.Wait for a bit and see how she goes and the concerns may just resolve themselves.
If you eventually think you need to explore further then go see your GP and don't be put off by anyone. My first GP actually said to me "Mrs xx if you keep talking about autism you will make him autistic !"
good luck

If you have a crappy HV go straight to the GP and get a referral from them. You have a right to a second opinion so make sure you get what you want. I was lucky that I had a good HV and she was very helpful when it came to getting my DS1 assessed. I never saw the GP about it at all.

Waiting until she is 2 is probably a good idea as it seems to be a magic number for some professionals who won't take you seriously before then.

That said my DS1 said only a few words for a long time and then when he was 21 months there was an explosion of words and he was talking in 3 or 4 word sentences by the time he turned 2. It can literally happen overnight.

Niecie,
that's exactly what my ds1 was like, just a little later.

nimnom, weird isn't it?! I can pinpoint the weekend it all changed too!

In our LA you can self-refer to a SALT if you have concerns over your child's language.

DD had a severe stutter from 2.1 to 2.6 and was also very 'behind' in her language compared to all (or so it seemed to me!) her contempories. She would also just groan/whine rather than ask for help and we had to play 20 questions to find out what was wrong. We saw a SALT and got some good tips on how to speak to her and also how to listen(!) but she is now 2.8 and chattering away like billyo, suddenly everything seems to have 'clicked' for her and she's away.

Hope things get better for your dd - I know they say you mustn't compare, but when your child seems to be the only one not doing something, you can't help but worry, can you?

(in my case the situation was not helped by MIL saying 'well, you do speak very fast, LC, she probably can't understand you' - yeah, so the that's why the whole of Liverpool is suffering from speech delay, then? )

niecie,
Yes, me too and he hasn't stopped talking since and that was three years ago!!

Smiley Linda - I am late joining this conv but you def shouldnt have to be on your own worrying about Carrie and whether she has ASD or not. If your health visitor wont refer you to a peadiatrician, your GP might. I am a speech therapist and it sounds like a referral to your local speech therapy department would be useful too? Where I work, you can refer yourself (may be a number in the yellow pages) or you could ring your local hospital and ask for a number - you will get through somehow! Your GP would also be able to refer. There are so many reasons why kids are late to talk and it is so common! And - the normal range that they talk is so varied as well! The website www.talkingpoint.org.uk has some parent advice about this.