Two year old still silent......

[DukesofHazzardMum]

My two year old DS is not saying any little words and only makes the occasional sound he is not even saying Dada or Mama and no matter how much I try and spend time and talk to him he does not want to know....I have four and he is 3rd eldest and the only boy. Has anyone else got this problem with their little ones and if so any advice??

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My 24 month old has less than 10 words, most of which are unintelliginble other than to me, but he does babble, and we are going to have his hearing re-tested as he failed his first test and there is congenetial hearing loss in the family (DS1 has mild loss, DS2 has glue ear plus suspected loss).

He couldn't say anything a month ago though.

what do your instincts tell you? Mine tell me that DS3's speech isn't right, but you know your child best.

RE: the Austism thing (just read that bit) DS1 (AS) usally responds, but it's harder to pick up on as he tends to be engrossed in his world- he may nod or whatever, but won't necessarily bother to make eye contact or come. If I say 'Sam go do this', he might, but equally he's likely to be so involved in whatever he is doing (his obsessions) that he doesn't seem to process it, or even will wait half an hour then click into it. But he does respond, if only you know how to look.

Hi Peachyclair, I may be overreacting, my instincts say not sure at the mo.....but when I call him he looks at me and when I ask him where is his dummy he makes a noise and starts looking for it and if he finds it he picks it up.....

DS3 did the dummy thing (works a treat doesn't it LOL?), so I would say that he COULD be a late starter like my DS? TBH, maybe it's the dummies ? Get his hearing checked certainly, but I wouldn't panic.

Hi PeachyClair....yep he loves his dummy is so attached to it....maybe you right...will def get his hearing checked....thanks

Hi fimbelle, sorry to hear you're still no nearer to being reassured about your ds's hearing.
I don't know much about this, but putting a small child under general anaesthetic just to test his hearing sounds like madness to me! Every once in a while you hear about a child who died after being put under GA. Why can't he have a normal hearing test?

My ds's hearing was tested like this: first they play him a sound that's quite loud and easy to hear, and at the same time a little box in a corner of the room lights up and you can see a cuddly toy moving inside it. Then the box goes dark again. They do this a few times to condition him to look for the moving toy whenever he hears the sound. In between sounds, they distract him to make him look away from the box with the toy. Then they play him sounds in all the important frequencies without getting the toy to move. If he turns his head to look at the box with the toy, they can be sure he can hear that particular frequency, and they make the toy move to "reward" him.

We had to do the test in two parts as DS got bored half way through the first part, but so what!

Does sound like an odd way to do a hearing test. My DD has glue ear and is down for tonsils/adenoids removal in Nov. When we've been to ENT consultant they use a machine with a thing they put in each ear and then get a reading that shows how clear her ears are. Maybe its different for more complex hearing issues and this just gives a basic reading??? But while this hearing investigation is going on is anything else happening? If its not a hearing issue and is a developmental issue then you could be looking into that at the same time. The ENT people won't deal with that as far as I know, you'd have to see GP or HV (whichever is best) and ask about this.
I'm intrigued about Caththerese's source of info on autism, do you mind me asking CT where you get your info from? It sounds a little off!

Hi Fimbelle - speaking as an audiologist, putting a toddler under GA to do a hearing test is the very last resort. They're probably referring you to somewhere with better facilities (and staff?!) to do similar tests that Homsa mentioned. They should give behavioral testing a good go first.

Most of the info I have about autism has been gleaned from speech delay.com (which I used to visit a lot when I was worried about dd's late talking) and from the DSM manual that psychiatrists use. The 'not responding to name' thing is often mentioned in these sources as an 'autistic thing'. I am sure, like jim jams said, that autistic kids do respond to their names in one way or another. The gist of what I have read is that an autistic toddler might not look at you when you call their name (without saying or doing anything else to get their attention, that is).
To be honest, I always thought that this 'symptom' was a bit of a dubious one, as most toddlers are easily distracted and often won't listen when you call them, or at least not right away.
I ony mentioned it to DukesofHazzard mum because it IS something that is cited in diagnostic manuals and speech delay websites (which are heavily populated by parents of autistic kids)and since her non-talking child DOES look at her when she calls him, that is surely (at least to some extent) a good sign for his not being autistic. But it seems to have upset jim jams and other mothers of autistic kids on this thread. I am really sorry about this. I was not implying that autistic children do not know their own name, or anything insulting. And jim jams did say that while her autistic son responds to his name, it is in a slightly different way to the way her non-autistic son responds.

Re. the hearing test, what they really need is for the child to be absolutely calm. When my children were tested as babies the audiologist was really pleased if they were asleep because that gave him perfect conditions to do the test.

caththerese, you haven't upset me. I just noticed that you seem to be very confident in your info about autism but had never mentioned actually KNOWING any children with autism. Which doesn't mean that I was assuming that you don't know any children with autism, the info just sounded a bit like it was out of a text book rather than from RL iyswim. ASD dx is being refined all the time and, of course, Paediatricians (who usually dx ASD) usually have plenty of hands-on experience.
Sorry if I sounded rude!

Davros it is true that I do not personally know any kids with autism so perhaps to some extent I am speaking out of my ass. I guess I often feel an urge to proffer what I know to mothers of late-talking kids simply because my dd, while not autistic, was indeed a late talker, and hence I picked up some info about related disorders while I was looking into that.
And also I get an urge to reiterate that late-talking, more often than not, does not signal a serious disability, but is simply just that child's timetable. But I'm not advocating the wait and see attitude. A kid of two who doesn't talk at all should be checked out for hearing and developmental problems. But if the parents can investigate WITHOUT hitting the panic button and assuming that the child is autistic then I think that is better for everyone. If the child does indeed turn out to be autistic or otherwise disabled, what has been gained by excessive anxiety BEFORE diagnosis? (Of course one can't help getting a bit anxious about such things.But I worried and worried and as it turned out the worry was unecessary, and to some extent blighted my child's toddlerhood).

Hi Caththerese, I was very interested to read your post, as I'm in the same situation that you must have been in. My DS is now 2.2 and has only in the last couple of weeks started to say a few barely intelligible words (mama, daddy, auto (German for "car"), and "hase", which is a made-up name for his fav cuddly toy). While I am very encouraged by this, he is of course still significantly delayed. But you are so right about not driving yourself mad with worry about autism, which is what everyone seems to think about when you mention speech delay! We have a 2-hour appointment coming up at the Child Development Clinic, I was wondering if you had been to something similar and could give me an idea what to expect? Also, any links or books you could point me to would be much appreciated!

Well, you only have to read this thread and many others to understand that late talking is not necessarily an indcicator of autism. I would say that my DD has not been the quickest to say words but has all the other beaviour that goes with normal communication (eye contact, shared attention, pointing etc) plus as playing and copying. So I don't think that anyone on MN who knows about autism would think that "late" talking only (and I wouldn't consider 2yrs late if the other things are OK) is an indicator.
However, a LOT is to be gained by looking into potential developmental problems if there really is good cause.
I also have to go back to your example of a late talker who turned out to be absolutely fine because he was Einstein! You couldn't have chosen a worse example, as I said before, Einstein is now believed to have been on the autistic spectrum, although I don't see what evidence there is for that, but it is commonly stated.

hey dukesofhazzardmum,
I really shouldnt worry about it too much, my ds was completley silent at 2 except fot the odd mamma and dadda and it worried the hell outta me until i found that alot of other mums had the same thing.
hes now 4.5 and wont shutup! His speech is amazing and still amazes me now with his pronounciation of certain words.

The one thing that did help me was my childminder,who insisted on not letting him have what he wanted until he tried asking. sounded harsh at first but it really worked because he stopped the baby babbling and using baby words.

my ds is 25mths and doesn't talk except for 'no' (great, just great ).

but... he babbles alot, points at everthing, waves at people, nods yes or no etc etc.

i worry alot but dw insists hes ok and refuses to take him to a SALT or for a hearing test or anything. we've argued about this a few times and she swears that he is OK and not to worry. i guess i'll just have to be patient and wait and see what happens.

DaddyCool, sounds like my dh and me a few months back! It's really difficult when you don't see eye to eye on these things, isn't it.

When ds had his hearing tested, the audiologist told me that there was a "tricky time" between age 2.3 and 3 (or thereabouts) when they are too clever for the type of hearing test I described earlier in this thread, but not clever enough for tests that require more cooperation (eg they are asked to push a button every time they hear a sound). BlackWidow should be able to tell you if that's true, but if it is, you should probably push for a hearing test NOW!

We had an assessment with a SALT and tbh she didn't really tell us anything new, just gave some general advice on how to improve our communication with ds (most of which we were doing anyway). So I'm not sure if that's a route worth going down at the moment (they don't start proper SALT until age 2.5 in my area anyway).

Daddycool, I would definitely go for a hearing test, what harm can there be? And I was VERY surprised to find that DD has glue ear and the monitoring machine flatlined on one ear.

homsa
I did make an appointment for dd to be assessed when she wasn't talking, but due to bureacratic bungling we missed the appt. by the time next appt came round (about six weeks later) she had improved so much that I no longer felt she needed to go! Talking can come on almost overnight, or at least it did in my experience.
So I am sorry that I cannot help you there. Different methods of assessment are used in different countries, too. I think in the US they are pretty uptight about speech delay (you read of kids as young as 17 or 18 months being in speech therapy - that is ridiculous if you ask me)In UK and Australia they are slower to suspect a problem.
One thing that interested me in your post was that you said he uses the German word for car. Are you a bilingual family, or living in Germany but speaking English at home? Because kids who grow up in bilingual environments are very often slower to speak. Of course, in the long term, they are advantaged!
Does your son point at things he wants, or point to things of interest? According to jim-jams and other mums of autistic kids on this thread, pointing is an important developmental stage. If your son still does not point at things, he should probably be checked out by a developmental specialist.
It is encouraging that he is picking up a few words at last, and you will probably find that he will bandy those around for a few weeks and then really start to bloom. I honestly could not count how many new words my dd seemed to come up with each day, once she finally took off.
Had to laugh at daddycool's post about her child who will only say no - that was all my dd would say for MONTHS and it drove me mad!
And (just teasing Davros here, a little!) I came across another eg recently of a famous, successful late talker - Courtney Love! According to her bio, she did not talk until three and was diagnosed autistic.
I guess this may not be a comforting example of a late talker from everyone's point of view though!

She managed to say "yes" to Steve Coogan though

Caththerese, thanks for your reply. I really hope my ds will go the same way as your dd! A friend of mine said that all we needed to get ds talking was an appointment for the assessment, and he'd start speaking in sentences a couple of days before... just to show us up as neurotic parents. Seems to have worked for your family!

Yes, we used to be bilingual - one parent, one language, with me speaking German, dh speaking English. However, when ds was still not saying any words at 2yo, we had endless rows about it - dh wanted me to stop speaking German as he thought that if there was some kind of language disorder, the bilingualism would throw ds back even further. Eventually I gave in, but still feel really bad about it. I'm hoping that they will tell us at the assessment that it won't make any difference whether we use 2 languages or just 1.

Re the pointing - well, he waves his hand in the general directing of the things he wants, but he doesn't point out things of interest, and he doesn't point with the index finger. For a while, this drove me mad with worry, especially after reading so many posts here that link non-pointing with autism. BUT I then realised that ds has other ways of sharing attention - eg the other day we were having dinner with friends, there was music on in the background, but so low you couldn't really hear it. Then there was a lull in the conversation, and ds noticed the music, turned to me with a big smile on his face and signed "music" ! If that's not shared attention, then I don't know what is! (BTW, he only has 3 signs and refuses to learn any more)

Homsa- the latest research shows that bilingual children are not affected detrimentally- and are not later to speak. So if you want to speak German - do. In fact the latest research showsn that parents should always speak their natural langauge to their child- and that is beneficial. Will see if I can find something later to show your dh- but there's a summary in the latest NCT mag as well. Ideally children would be playing with children fluent in both languages but that's not always going to happpen.