Ds, 23mths, not really talking. Advice Please ?

[RachD]

Ds 23 mths not really talking.
He had a febrile convi=ulsion the other day.
They say he has an ear infection - 2nd infection in a month.
Also, A&E said he had very waxy ears that would probably need to be drained.

He has 4 friends one month older than him - i.e. 2.
At 18 mths they all had a vocab of 20-30 words.
At 20 mths they all had a vocab of 30-40 words.
At 23 mths they all said 2 word sentences e.g. "more milk".
At 24 mths they all said 4 or 5 word sentences, e.g. " playdo makes you sick", " I don't like cheese".

Ds, at 23 mths, has a vocab of less than 10 words.
He can not say, dog, cat, house, milk.

He says ooes = shoes
He says ootball = football
He says arf = bath
he says ar = car or star.
He says or = more.

Other than mummy and daddy, and bye bye , those are the only words he can say.

should I be concerned ?
My dh thinks I am paranoid, but I really think there is something wrong.

No real experince of this but possibly if he is not hearing properly due to blocked ears then that is affecting his ability to pick up vocab?

I was always worried about dds speach. She probably only said 10 words until she was 2 and then I went back to work and she went to nursery

OMG what a difference that made!!!

Now shes 2.4, still a little behind but is saying 2 word sentances and I can't shut her up

I think as long as he understands you and makes it known to you what he wants there shouldn't be any need to worry for a good few months yet

HTH

Thank you topbanana.
Ds is at nursery three days a week. He loves it.

He responds very well to instructions.
If you say, go and get your socks and shoes, he will go up to his room, into his sock draw, choose a pair of socks, pick up a pair of shoes nad bring them to you, sayine "ooes, ooes".

so this is very encouraging.
he obviously understands.

But the speech is not there.
And specifically the first syllable of a word.
Why is that ?

This is probably just something that will come, probably all of a sudden.

That being said, how is his eating? If he eats well (adult food) then the muscles of his mouth are probably fine.

Also, does he actually say "ootball"? Or what? That word's a lot more complicated than the others ...

I would get his hearing checked, just to be safe.

have you talked to your dr. or health visitor for your concern?

RachD. You could be describing my DS2. he's 21 months and says Mummy, Daddy, hiya, bye, pider (for spider) ninner (for dinner), nana (for banana) Mamoo (for Matthew, his brother), nanny, and that's about it. Oh, and he says 'Hello' very nicely, strangely enough!

His brother was well ahead of him in speaking at this stage.

However he understands everything you say to him and acts on instructions (get this, get that, give mummy this, do you want a banana etc)

I'm impressed by 'ootball' though, esp if he pronounces the 'b'.

I wouldn't worry, lots of children at 2 don't say much but you can't shut them up a year later.

Mine was the same. Despite being obsessed by tractors since the age of 1, at 24 months he still just said "karkar". Despite chasing two dogs around the house from birth he could only say "oofoof". And he could say mummy and daddy, but didn't even attempt to say his siblings names. Had about 12 words, all nouns, no descriptive or linking words at all, no attempts to make sentences. But masses of babbling and long discussions with people - just none of it made any sense.

We took him to a speech therapist at 24 months - she said "hmmmm, yes, slow development, not forming consonants properly, too gutteral in the back of the mouth, try some blowing exercises (straws, bubbles etc) and come and see me in 4 months when it will be easier to do something about it".

Duly took him back the other day (he is now 26mths) - and she sacked him! Doesn't need to see him again. Delighted with his progress, he is now talking away - not very intelligibly to anyone except me and dh etc - but long sentences, lots of verbs etc etc. She said the fact that his pronunciation wasn't brilliant wasn't an issue - ie your ootball instead of football - the important thing was that the number of syllables and the vowel sounds that he was using was appropriate. So when he says "gonna give de pider uppatea" (which is obviously "I'm going to give the spider a cup of tea!" (she had odd props in her room!), that was fine.

So I'd talk to your GP about yuor concerns just so you can get a referral to a speech therapist, because they take a few months to come through and she might find some issues there, but I think it really is true that some children just take longer to get it together than others, and boys particularly so. You could have a completely grown up intelligible conversation with my dd at 2.5yrs - just different.

HTH

My ds is just 2 and has very limited speech. He says, mummy, daddy, hello, digger, tea and bye. He can't say his sister's name and calls her "dada". I worried for a while because my friend's dd who is 3 months younger than him, can actually hold a conversation. I keep thinking a year from now we probably won't be able to shut him up. He also has extremely waxy ears.

My eldest ds didn't speak any owrds at all until he was 26 months. He is now a very bright 9 year old, so please don't worry. It is fatal to compare your child with others, even though we all do it!

My ds saw a speech therapist a couple of times and from that experience, i gathered that what was important was whether the child understood what was said to them. As ds had long been able to follow quite complex instructions, they weren't too woried about him. He did get referred to a hearing test in ahospital though. I was also told be the Speech Therapist that it didn't matter how he said the words (ie they didn't have to be pronounced correctly) as long as it was understood what he was saying by someone and he used the same sounds consistently for a word, therefore ooes is fine for shoes.

My advice to you would be to speak to your HV and see if he can be referred, if only to put your mind at rest. My second son had (has) stammering problems and I know that where we lived when this arose (London) there was a drop in speech therapy clinic in my health centre which we could attend without a referral. Might be worth you trying to find out about?

But really, my honest opinion is that 3 words said correctly and 5 others said incorrectly but coherently, is pretty good going. HTH

Message withdrawn

RachD. My ds is exactly the same as yours, although he's one month younger. I've been getting worried too as his sister at the same age was talking in short sentences, could name colours and her speech was quite clear.

Interesting advice/experiences here, feel a bit reassured now

NEVER compare a little boy's speech to that of a girl. Us girls are MILES ahead in speech development from day one!!!
Comparing boy to boy more useful but still there are huge differences in rate of development...

Thanks pph. I know you're right about not comparing, it's just hard when I see him struggling to communicate, he gets so frustrated.

Ooops, I have that book - had totally forgotten! (dd didn't need it)

RachD - are you going to wait and see what happens? Or aks for a referral?

Thank you everyone.
Dh, ds and I are going to see Gp tonight to talk about convulsion, waxy ears, and I will bring up topic of speech aswell.

Apart from "ummy" and "addy", ds's first word was "ootball"

• so Notquitecockney, and wordsmith , you were impressed, yeah ?

When ds said 'ootball as his first word, dh LOVED it !
Dh is a MASSIVE Spurs fan.
I quite like football too.
Ds shows no interst in tv, apart from, he loves
Wallace & gromit, and ....... football !

We all know that we shouldn't compare, don't we ?

But we all want our children to be "normal", don't we ?

I know I shouldn't compare, but I just can't help it.

NQcockney - he eats like a trooper and will eat ANYTHING.

my ds is 23 months old and his speech development is excellent. (so far)
however, he was a slow walker and he got his first tooth at 11 months.

so, all babies are different!!

I will investigate the drop in centre- thank you lonelymum .

And thank you to all of you,. for your similar experiences - I do feel a bit better.

Hi RachD, any news on your DS? My DS is 2.5 and in the same boat as yours from the sound of it.

After several ear infections in the space of one year he was referred to ENT. They gave him a hearing test and we were surprised to hear that his hearing is poor as he understands everything we say. They said that he has a build up of fluid in his middle ears and suggested that he has grommets fitted (we have been given a date for this in March).

Like yours, my DS also misses out the first part of a word "ooes" for shoes, "oo" for two and "eeee" for three and so on and so forth.

We were relieved to hear that his lack of speech was down to his ear problems and are so looking forward to getting this sorted!

Also, DS had a febrile convulsion before Christmas, caused by high temp brought on by yet another ear infection. I have never been so frightened in my whole life - I was here on my own with him when it happened.

Has your GP recommended an ENT referral?

my dd has just seen the speech therapist as she has a cleft in the soft palate. she now says: hello,
hiya,
al gan (all gone),
wot dat (what's that),
ahh doggy (dog),
mama,
dada,
lots of different sounding ahh's (like she's singing!).
also understands a lot of words:
ball,
phone,
bath,
bed,
breakfast,
dinner,
and a few others that i can't think of right now!
but speech therapist wasn't happy with this
she told me from now on seak to her in two word sentences rather than full adult length sentences. for example:
coat on.
insead of:
let's put your coat on.
i'm trying to talk like this but it's hard when i'm used to using bigger sentences.

oh, another thing i got told was to aim dd to start saying word's with p and b in them! just thought i'd let you know.

Hi RachD
I have a dd with speech delay she is 3.4y
At 34 mths she was classed as non verbal by saying mama dada yaya (for water)
She has no hearing issues but I wanted to tell you that from nowhere it just came.
Does he appear to understand you?
At 24 mths though they will readily refer you to Speech Therapy for an assessment, and get his audiology fully checked out.
WE have been through all this. They are reluctant to refer before age 2 though.
WE have seen amazing progress, not due to speech therapy as we found them for better words.. totally useless... but thats just our area.
Just wanted to let you know some good news

I have a DD1 who is now almost 5. She was referred to a SALT when she was almost 3, as she had v ltd speech and poor pronunciation.

2 years later she has improved dramatically, although still struggles wrt intonation and some longer words.

Hope all went well with gp.