Feeling so despondent about speech delay

[Gimmegimmegimmee]

I have a beautiful boy who will be 3 in June. He has delayed speech and we are currently under SaLT and ENT. He is on the waiting list for grommets due to glue ear although he is ‘passing’ hearing tests so I’m not sure how much grommets will help if his hearing is ok.

He has around 50 words and is putting 2/3 words together although tends to be the same words (bye mumma, hi grandad, no thank you). His enunciation is pretty poor too. SaLT think he is on the right path and we just need to keep up with the strategies we have learned to help him.

I’m just absolutely exhausted from the worry and from trying to stay positive. I know he needs me to stay positive and strong, but it’s so hard. I hear so many stories from people about children that didn’t talk until later, and I have to admit every morning I wake up hoping today will be the day that he has a language explosion. He had a very good few days last week where he was particularly chatty but today has been awful and he’s mainly spent it screeching at me.

Not sure why I’m posting, I just feel sad and helpless.

I had a son who was just like this.

He is now in his 30s and is in a professional role that requires a LOT of talking. I don't think he spoke at all before 3 - but his hearing was fine, and he'd caught up by about the age of 5.

Please don't worry - kids are all different and it sounds like he'll catch up.

My 7 year old was like this though his pronunciation is still iffy he speaks loads. My two year old currently has 10 words I get how hard it is to stay positive when it seems like your getting no where. Both of mine gave had grommets and tonsil and adenoids done.

Completely understand OP. I've got a 2&a half year old who has no words at all and I'm still fighting to get him seen by the audiologist sooner rather than later. Apparently it's a 31 week wait here which is bloody ridiculous. He'll be almost 3 at that point. Especially when factoring in that I've got deaf parents and a good few deaf relatives. It just feels like they're making out I'm just worried about nothing but when you see other kids their age speaking volumes it's so soul destroying. Sorry for the long post, I just wanted you to know that I completely know what you are feeling 😊

My eldest had grommets at two and her speech improved immediately after the surgery, I hope you’re not waiting too much longer.

My youngest was referred to speech and language at 3 and was very similar to how you describe. He caught up and was discharged from SALT just before turning 6.

I know it’s worrying but he’s still really little

My son was like this and I was so worried about him. I spent many a night in bed doom scrolling on here trying to find answers or reassurance and would drive myself crazy about it. It really ate me up during those younger years. I think he was very frustrated because he couldn't communicate properly and he's extremely bright. DD was always an amazing talker so it was hard to see him struggle.

He's 5 now and went up to a counter in the shop on Saturday and paid for his sweets himself and was chatting away to the shop lady. Pre school and starting reception was the making of him really

My son was very speech delayed. He started speech therapy at three and his speech was still poor when he started school. We paid for a private speech therapist who went into school and worked with him every couple of weeks and then gave exercises to us and the school. He saw her for a couple more years but his speech still wasn’t perfect. Really it took most of primary school for him to catch us with his peers.

Today, he is taking four A levels and predicted A and A* in all of them. He got 10 excellent GCSE’s. My point is this may be a long road but it will improve over time and it does not mean he will necessarily struggle academically.

My ds1 had a speech disorder and couldn't talk to be understood by strangers until he was 6yrs old.

His speech was considered within the normal range by the time he was 8yrs old

After GCSEs he decided to go to the local grammar school for A levels. He joined the debating team and his team won the local, regional and the national competitions and were invited to the European Youth Parliament. He is now at university and has been President at European Youth Parliament debates.

It was an incredibly hard process teaching him to talk but he astounds me daily!

My little boy is the same.
My daughter was a very early speaker. I'm pretty sure I thought it was because I was good at teaching her to speak ha.

Anyway I'm a secondary school teacher. They can all talk. So I look at them all and presume that my son one day will also be an annoying teenager yapping away.

@Devilsmommy thank you for your reply and sorry you are going through the same thing. You are right, it’s completely soul destroying seeing your child struggling with something that you just assume will come naturally to them. My only advice is to hound the audiology department for any cancellations/appointments that come up sooner. Good luck.

@encroyable just had a little cry at your post, I can only imagine how proud you must of him. I am exactly the same and scour these boards looking for similar experiences to give me hope. But it only makes me worse as I read the stories with a less positive outcome and I become convinced this will happen to him. Like your DD, my eldest was and still is an amazing talker which makes seeing my youngest struggle even harder.

@Cactuscuddles you must be so proud of your son 💙 I will do whatever it takes to help him and know it may be a long road ahead and need to accept the bad days as well as the good. I’m just an exhausted and emotional mum right now 😭

@lorisparkle this is wonderful 😭 what a wonderful mum you are and how proud you must be 💙

@Threeandahalf my eldest was an early talker too which looking back I was probably quite smug about! Not so much now!

@Gimmegimmegimmee although everyone's experiences are different hopefully hearing some positive stories helps a little with the worry.

I'm a Speech Therapist ( albeit with adults) and both my children had speech therapy input, one is deaf and was very delayed, and the other had a speech sound disorder and was very unintelligible until 4. You'd not know this with either now. You've done the right thing by having them known to the right professionals!

Lots of lovely positive stories here, don’t get disheartened. Also don’t pay attention to websites etc saying there is a narrow window for intervention after which it’s not possible to acquire speech. I spent so much time worrying about that.

My own DC started school at 4.5 unable to say a single word. He had severe dyspraxia (motor) difficulties, only diagnosed by the school SALT, and didn’t say his first word till 5 and could not speak intelligibly till nearly 8. He now chatters for England and uses lots of long words eg he was talking about convergent evolution the other day!

My top tip would be focus on other communication methods as well until he can talk. According to all the SALTs we saw this does not delay speech. For example, cards with choices on them and when DS older than your son, (nearer 4) we had a little drawing board we carried round so he could draw us pictograms.

@JumpingJill thank you 🙏 He will start school next year, and be one of the younger ones in his year, and even though it seems a long way off I’m so anxious about if he’ll be talking by then. I’m also anxious about getting him potty trained but that’s a whole other issue!

Aww OP! much can change in that year and a bit! He may very well catch up. Many children do. Make sure you enjoy this precious time and don’t spend too much of it worrying.

However as a practical step if he isn’t talking by January next year, you should apply for an EHCP. This can take some time to get, but our nursery took the lead on this. This would give you a wider choice of schools (as it’s based on ability to meet his needs not catchment).

We actually found starting school a game changer in a very positive way as the EHCP secured regular speech therapy, whereas there had been no useful input at all from any professional before that point. This does depend on finding an inclusive and supportive school but some are truly wonderful!

My son is now 4, he also had quite a severe speech delay.

He started saying words clearly just before age 1 and then had covid very badly. It blocked his ears (we now know) and his speech stopped completely.

By age 2 he had virtually no speech, by age 3, he had a few words but none of them were clear.

I pushed and pushed but my HV team just kept telling me he was improving and would be eventually be ok. I had to push them, hard, for a referral to SALT and they kept messing it up so we lost a year between 2 and 3. After getting a clear hearing test after nearly a year of asking, I booked a private speech therapist who diagnosed him with a severe speech delay due to historical glue ear.

At the same time as we started with the speech therapist, I sent him to pre school, earlier than planned.

The 2 things combined made a world of difference. My son is like a different child. We worked really hard with the homework the speech therapist gave us and within 3 months, she signed him off. 3 months after that, his NHS SALT appointment came through and they also signed him straight off.

His speech is now crystal clear, his vocabulary is huge and advanced for his age (confirmed by pre school) and he is flying.

I know private speech therapy is not accessible to all but keep pushing at every avenue and start him in a childcare setting if you can. Speak slowly and reduce your words as starting point - simple 3 word sentences were our starting point. Instead of, 'right, let's go and get our shoes and put them on' we made it 'put shoes on' (just an example). It made an immediate impact.

We didn't even attempt potty training until his speech was up to it - pre school and our therapist agreed with this. We potty trained at 3 years, 3 months and he got it within 2 days and was dry overnight straightaway too. So please don't worry about that!

Best of luck to you, keep pushing.

@JumpingJill thank you so much for the advice. Nursery have put in an SSS referral for him so I’m hoping they will be able to support us with an EHCP if needed. I know it’s great that we have the right professionals in place but also feels daunting too if that makes sense.

@Fiorenzsay that’s super interesting as we think my son had Covid a few months after turning 1. He was quite poorly, and up until that point he had a few words, but it was that winter that we realised he was behind with his speech and it didn’t really progress. Hopefully now we have the right support in place we will start to see some faster progress like your son! We’ve actually had a really lovely evening tonight and he’s been chatting away (although a lot of it is still indecipherable!) so I’m feeling a bit better about things.

My dad was still only saying "Mama", "Dada" etc when he was 2.5 so my grandma took him to the paediatrician (not UK), who told her to bring him back if there was no improvement by age 3. And lo and behold, he turned 3 and just started talking.
Now he speaks 3 or 4 languages quite well and has spent most of his career working in a linguistics-related field.
He is quite introverted in his temperament though, and is still a man of fairly few words. He tends to think through what he's going to say, and then say it. (Which I realise is normal for many people, but if you're like me, and don't know when you start a sentence how it's going to end, it's quite eye opening to realise there are people who mentally plan out sentences at a time before saying them out loud!) Sometimes I think he just didn't want to talk as a toddler until he was able to say the full sentences he wanted to say!

Really nice to read these positive stories. My DS is 3 and a half and has only just started talking in short phrases and using a range of different words. He had grommits at two and a half but 3 he only had about 20 words or so. We see a SALT every couple of months and his preschool are great.
I am considering having his adenoids out so wondered if people could share their experiences of affect on speech.

@Allswellthatendswelll they will remove my son’s adenoids at the same time as putting the grommets in - SaLT say that enlarged adenoids can also cause a speech delay but who knows!

Hi there,

No advice here,

just to say I am in a similar position with my 3.7 year old, who starts school just after he turns 4 in September. He’s recently been diagnosed with a speech sound disorder.

just to say I feel you, it’s such a lonely situation to be in and the worry is unreal. I’ve lost so much sleep over it looking for solutions and also hoping for that “language explosion” you describe.

sending you a hug, & hoping our babies improve over time.

Dawn

I’ve been there too and so I understand how you might be feeling - or at least I can tell you how I felt.

your DS will be ok. Worst case scenario and his speech doesn’t really improve I don’t think it will have the same consequences these days there are so may different ways of communicating and technology is always improving. People are much more tolerant to differences these days.

what’s important is that you get comfortable with this stage of his life. I get it; it’s not what you expected, not want you want for your child and it’s lonely. I went to baby signing classes and I felt so low that all the babies were getting their certificate and saying and signing their first words whilst I was still on the first level. I began to skip classes not being able to turn up week after week which was the worst thing for me and not ideal for DD.

surround yourself with supportive people, be your sons biggest advocate and never allow others to say anything that might damage his confidence. I had to be really forceful to FIL once when he would loudly say “ what’s he saying ? I can’t understand a single word he’s saying”

Your son will thank you for it

50 words and two words together don't sound too bad!

My boy has just turned three and I think he says a couple of words a day but not many different ones. Probably less than thirty. He has suspected glue ear in one ear and waiting for the next appointment. Also on the waiting list for a speech and language to therapy assessment. He is beginning to get rather frustrated.

@Gimmegimmegimmee Hello, some update?

@Dadofboy842 Hi, he’s doing really well thank you. He had grommets in and his tonsils out and it’s been life changing for him. His word count tripled within a month and now I’ve lost count of how many words he has. He’s putting 3/4/5 word sentences together and, although his clarity is still a bit iffy, he’s not far off being discharged from SALT. It’s amazing how glue ear can affect a child’s development at that age and so frustrating that it isn’t always taken seriously.