Colton's Speech

I don't think I've ever blogged about this before, but about a year ago, Colton suddenly began stuttering.  It was such a change in the way he spoke that his nursery leaders (who only see him once a week) pulled me aside to ask if something had happened that week to cause it.  Like every parent, we googled stuttering, and at his next doctor's appointment I asked his pediatrician about it.  Pretty much everyone gave the same answer: it's very normal for a 3-year-old to stutter.  For now, just ignore it.  Don't tell them to hurry up when they're trying to talk or act frustrated when they can't find their words.  Let it play it out and it usually goes away on its own.

So that's what we've been doing.  Ignoring it.  And that was fine.

Until a month ago when it suddenly got really bad.  That weekend, he could hardly get any words out at all-- he'd get hung up on the "I" at the beginning of the sentence, and after saying that 15 or 20 times, he might finally pause, look at me sheepishly and admit, "I can't say it."

It broke my heart.

And it worried me no end.  Craig began calling around for speech therapists-- one charged $600 just for the assessment.  I bemoaned the fact that Craig's work changed our insurance this year and doesn't cover anything any more.  And during all this, I got a flyer in the mail for free audiology screenings.

Now, Colton's stutter does not sound like a hearing problem to me.  But, there have been other times where I've wondered how good his hearing is.  I mean-- he's obviously not deaf, or anything.  But when we read scriptures as a family, we'll have him repeat after us, and half the time the words he says are just gibberish.  And a third of the time he just looks at us blankly and says nothing at all.  So while I didn't think his hearing was related to the stuttering, I figured it wouldn't hurt to get it checked out, too.  So I made an appointment.

That was early last Thursday, and of course it was a pain.  We were getting there during peak traffic times, so it took a long time to drive across town.  And I'd brought Camille with me (in hindsight, that was dumb of me, but it didn't occur to me to make other arrangements for her).  But we got through it: he had to wear headphones and point to a picture of whatever the audiologist told him.  He put on different headphones and said "Bird" every time he heard a chirping noise.  And when it was all over, the audiologist politely explained that he wasn't hearing very well: he can't really hear whispering at all, and if you speak to him from the next room, he probably won't hear it.

She checked his ears and said there was fluid in both of them, so we need to bring him back in 6 weeks and have them checked again.  If, after three or four months, the fluid is still there we will need to bring him to an Ear, Nose & Throat doctor to determine if he needs tubes in his ears or something.

So we're waiting and seeing.  Ironically, the stutter got MUCH better after just a few days of being so terrible.  So I'm less anxious about the stuttering now.  But I am worried about his hearing.  And, perhaps even more so, I'm worried about the times I've gotten angry with him for not doing what I asked him to do-- how many of those times was he ignoring me because he's three (and that's what 3-year-olds do) and how many times was he simply not hearing me?

Visiting daddy's office, he decided to don some of Daddy's patriot gear

How could I ever have gotten angry at this sweet boy?