speech delay at 3

When we took G in for the first in a series of evaluations for his delayed speech, more than one professional told us that our kid avoided eye contact and interactions.  They told us in longer and less clear words that he didn't want to communicate with us, that we should encourage him to interact with us by making it more fun.

I tried to tell them that my boy wanted to communicate with us, his Mama and Daddy.  He was desperate to communicate.  I tried to point out that most kids wouldn't give great eye contact when they are faced with an entire wall of toys they have never seen before.  I tried to tell them that he was different at home.  I tried to tell them that I was an oddball as a kid too... that I just wasn't on the same wavelength as my classmates.  (One woman actually made a joke out of that.  I still get angry when I think of her.  The same woman said, "Oh, he will definitely qualify for special education, don't you think?" and I had to hold back the tears until we made it out of that office. )  I tried to tell them that what they were seeing that was good, it had been built up recently.  He was making progress.  I tried to tell them that he loves to talk, the little he can.  He begs to communicate with us.  He doesn't like playing on his own forever.

They didn't see the same little boy I did.  Sometimes I want to take him back, to reintroduce them to him.  They would be amazed.  How could they not be... they thought he was uninterested in interacting with people.  I want to teach them about my boy, for the other parents sakes.  So maybe sometimes, they could listen to the parents perspective without casting it aside as denial or grasping at straws.  So sometimes, they might take a little more time and see a little more of the person growing in front of them.  Four out of four of the first professionals to meet our son suggested he might be on the Autism spectrum (because they couldn't say for sure that he fit that diagnosis and they couldn't think of other possibilities) and then got defensive when I asked pointed questions about Autism, expressed my doubts and asked if there were any other explanations for his language difficulties.  I did an unbelievable amount of reading about kids with early language delays, and about Autism and every time I read a description of it, I thought that doesn't seem like G.  But it kept coming up in the evaluations.  And I kept reading more, wondering, doubting, refusing to swallow that the thing causing his speech delay was something that he fit very few of the usual signs of.  He has since been diagnosed with Auditory Processing Disorder and we have very definitively ruled out Autism.

The truth was, at 3 years old, G had begun to give up.  To give up on us understanding him and understanding us.  He was angry.  He was scared.  He was sad and lonely and very very frustrated.  And he couldn't hear or understand a lot of what was said to him.  That's why there wasn't as much eye contact as there "should be".  Not even as much as there had been when he was younger and more oblivious to his isolation due to the language barrier.  We kept looking for an explanation that made sense.  We kept reading books, signing in ASL, acting things out, getting in his face while talking to him.  We kept hoping to understand what was going on in his head, and what he wanted to tell us.

He's 4 and a half now.  He can describe things.  He can ask for things politely.  He loves choices.  He loves us and tells us so frequently. He makes wonderful eye contact if he hears us.  He mishears words.  He gets lost if the sentences are too long or involved.  He gets frustrated when he needs to express negative emotions other than sadness.  He likes to tell his little sister what to do and what not to.  He can tell anyone his name and age.  He can navigate anywhere in the city by telling me which direction to turn the car.  He is mostly toilet trained.  He plays hide and seek with friends.  He doesn't understand days of the week.  He has gone from the language level of an infant (at just under 4 yrs old) to just under the language level of his neurotypical peers (at 4 1/2).

Look out world, my boy has a lot of things he wants to tell you!

I believe that the best expectations of what a child will and won't be able to do come from their parents gut feelings (not the horrible worst case scenarios and doubts my mind ran through over and over when faced with uncertainty and bad news about G.)