He'll grow out of it. You're sure of it... sometimes.
And then other times, you can't imagine how something so pronounced could just fade away. You wonder, if you just let it be, will everything work out? You believed it would... in the end.
But is that good enough?
Going back to Jack's first year of Montessori school, he was anything but average. He was three and a half years old...
At home, Jack was just like another other preschooler, learning how to talk, and often rambling on about some new discovery in his life. The only difference was we couldn't understand a word he said. No one, not even me. He figured out he wasn't speaking our language pretty quickly and would just look at us... not sad or frustrated, but in an intense, pensive manner, like he was thinking, Why isn't this working!?
At school, Jack wandered around the classroom watching other children work. He didn't participate. He would, if directed by his teacher, accept a lesson, but he'd never do the work on his own. He didn't say much getting by on as little as he could. His teacher said she wasn't too worried because she knew he was learning. You see as he wandered, if a child was stuck on their lesson he'd point to something to help them along. We all agreed to let him roam.
I knew this couldn't go on forever. I wanted him to be able to participate in school... and to make friends. This seemed important. This seemed urgent.
But Jack played chess. And he'd mix up four jigsaw puzzles and methodically solve all of them at once. Why couldn't he talk so we could understand him? He seemed smart... Everyone was sure he's grow out of it.
My gut feeling said he was different. It wasn't that he just wasn't talking... or having trouble learning to talk. He talked up a storm... just in his own mumble-jumbled language. When he looked confused, I knew he didn't know why we couldn't understand him. I was perplexed.
Luckily, I talk about things that perplex me with, well, pretty much anyone who will listen. After hearing my story, a neighbor mentioned our school district has a program called Child Find to help children like Jack. Thank goodness I shared... How long would it had taken me to discover that on my own?!
We went to see the people at Child Find. They tested Jack and they said, while he seemed advanced in many areas he did lack verbal skills appropriate for his age... and most importantly, his scores were low enough to qualify for their program.
When I heard he just barely qualified, I jumped for joy... Jack was going to get help.
I feared without help, he'd end up with a collection of bad experiences - like the degradation of being teased because he talked like a baby or the accumulation of self-doubt from consistently failing at new language dependent work at school. Such experiences could effect his self-assurance for a long time, if not forever.
Forever seemed like a long time... for me, help couldn't come fast enough. I felt like his isolation couldn't wait. So I also found a speech pathologist willing to see Jack at a reduced rate. You see, insurance companies only pay if there's a medical reason a child can't talk so others can understand them. He had no medical reason... and no one suspected he would have one.
Over a few months, Jack's articulation skills accelerate quickly. He became more and more understandable. He started stuttering, but that fixed it self rather quickly.
Wow, we could communicate!
I was ecstatic when I could understand even just half of what he said, and he was ecstatic to tell us what was on his mind.
By his second year of school, he made close friends and began to participate at school.
Jack's world started to open up.
