Friday we went to the Speech and Hearing clinic to have the little man checked out. WOW. It was not a good day. The Mr. had a meeting so he came about half way through. He missed the meltdown of a lifetime. Cobra was not liking being confined in that room. Nor did he like the high chair they tried to put him in in the middle of the tantrum.
We are now aware of a few "concerns". We also now have a few things to put into the practice. This is the biggest relief of all. From the get go it has just been a waiting and guessing game. Waiting to see what we need to do and guessing what the next person is going to say so it's nice to actually have something to do rather than just sit and worry.
A couple of the things she was worried about I'm a little iffy on. In the middle of his fit, little man slung a cup (it was empty, not that this matters, I'm just stating it as a fact) off the table. She felt this wasn't "age appropriate", that this is a "6 month old" thing to do. Now I don't think he should be doing this, I think he should know better, and I think I should correct it, but I don't think it's unreasonable behavior at this age. I think that if she is seeing this behavior stop at 6 months with the kids she is seeing, then she is seeing some super well behaved kids.
She also felt that "the tantrum", which was life altering I will admit, was a bit much. It went on for far too long, for no reason. She said it was as if he was mad about being there then by the middle he didn't even know why he was mad, he was just mad (but don't all kids go through this at one point or another or am I crazy). That he needs to learn to self calm. I felt, that the kid didn't get a good night's sleep, he was up for two hours in the middle of the night just lying there and tossing and turning, then he feel asleep 5 minutes before we got there, even though I left a half hour early in hopes that he would fall asleep on the way so he could get a half hour nap in before the appointment. And he was left to freely walk to the room, which he didn't want to go into, but was made to go in, so we started off with resistance. All this plus the fact that I really didn't know how much they wanted me to intervene so I didn't try to settle or soothe him much at all, lead to melt down central. 20 to 30 minutes of pure hell to put it exact, actually the fit itself wasn't too bad it was just never ending.
The main "concern" is eye contact. He makes good eye contact in general. He looks strangers straight in the eye. He makes friends with the cashiers at Publix weekly because of this. He made a three point....look? I can't remember what she called it exactly but he looked at a toy, then made eye contact with her, then back at the toy...a good sign. However, as I've been saying, when he makes a request the eye contact is lacking. I have been thinking that his lines of communication have been growing, in part because he has been grabbing you and taking you to what he wants, or putting what he wants in your hands, etc. But apparently I haven't clued in enough. When he has been doing this he hasn't been making eye contact. This was a major concern of hers. I understood and instantly knew what she meant when she brought it up. He would stare at your hands almost willing them to work to his benefit, it almost seemed like he didn't know that you were attached to them.
We have been working on this all weekend. If he wants something that I'm holding, I won't give it up until he makes eye contact, as per her suggestion. If I'm pushing him in his car, I will stop and wait for him to make eye contact, as if to ask why I stopped, before I start back. If he hands me something to open I will sit motionless until he looks me in the eye. It's amazing the number of times throughout the day that this little exercise can be worked in. And it has made great changes. Now I will say that while I recognized it had been happening once she pointed it out, I didn't notice it before so I hadn't been paying any attention to it. So I really have nothing to judge his performance now to, but it does seem that he's making that eye contact with less resistance and often times initially on his own, in just 3-4 days.
So obviously this is a social behavior issue which of course brings us back to the "a word". I asked and her response was it's too early to tell. But regardless of what the future will bring if she were us and there were any concerns she would address them. Which is how I feel. I mean can it really hurt to teach him to make better eye contact. However with such great change in such a short time, I'm beginning to wonder that since we can teach him to make better eye contact maybe we just didn't teach him.
She also told us to talk, talk, talk, talk, and talk some more. To be his "play by play announcer". This weekend I have talked, talked, talked, talked, and talked some more. So much that Sunday night my throat was sore. Mimic him, and don't put pressure on him to talk. Treat his babbling/jargon as real speech. It really does feel good to actually have something to put into play. This weekend I would pick every little thing apart that he did and wonder if it was a sign of anything. But now that I have processed things, and had a few meltdowns of my own, and most importantly seen changes in the kid, I'm back to a positive state of mind.
And now we wait again. Wait for Thursday when the E.I. therapist will come out to play with Cobra and see what she says. And wait to see what the speech and hearing wants to do. And wait for Thursday when the new season of Project Runway starts.
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