A New Journey with Penn

Around Penn's 18 month appointment I was starting to become aware of the fact the sweet child didn't have a whole lot of words.  Plenty of sounds and no problem making noise, but no real interest in forming more words than the few he had spoken for months.  At the appointment the doctor wasn't concerned and said a lot could change by his 2 year appointment and to wait until then.  I took that advice, but wasn't completely at peace about it.  Since the appointment Penn did start to show more interest in repeating word sounds I would make, etc., but he hasn't been very successful at adding to his vocabulary.  Now, again, this could be very normal for his age group and perhaps he will hit the two year mark and words will just come spewing forth, but after all we've been through with Tav I decided to pursue an evaluation in case he could have some services to help him get there.  

I have to pause here and thank a friend of mine for being really open about her own son needing an evaluation as he approached his two-year birthday.  If she hadn't shared their thoughts and plans with me I think I would've still been wondering about whether or not I should pursue the evaluation.  Her matter-of-fact, courageous and compassionate actions on her son's behalf drove me to go ahead and make the call on Penn's behalf.

The first step was calling Alliance, Pittsburgh's early intervention coordination agency for infants and toddlers.  Thus far our experience with them has been fantastic.  They are required by law to deliver services (if your child qualifies for them) within 45 days or your initial call to the agency.  Incredible speed and great efficiency (not exactly the way it works in the private sector).  We had our initial meeting with the coordinator we had been assigned about two weeks ago and then this Thursday morning the coordinator and a speech therapist returned for the evaluation.  Because of Penn's age, he had a full evaluation that included all his developmental faculties including communication.  The coordinator and the therapist were so sweet, kind and caring.  They loved working with Penn and he had a blast to the point where he got slap happy from all the focused attention (what's a third child to do with the devoted attention of the three women sitting on the floor engaging with him for two hours?).  I was so thankful that the whole thing was enjoyable for Penn.  They give you the results right there at the end of the evaluation.  I was pleased to see that Penn has some areas of real strength that are above the average for his age, but it turned out that his total communication score did fall just beneath the line where he qualifies for services.  The information that they charted for him then broke out that total communication number so that I could easily see that his receptive language skills (which I wasn't worried about) were in the average range, but his expressive skills were far below average.  The agency has recently changed the way they score children for services as they used to just need one of those two components to be below average to obtain services, but now they've combined the scoring of receptive and expressive language skills so that the total communication score is what determines the qualification.  I had prayed that if Penn needed a little help that his scores would come out that we would get services even though his receptive skills are fine.  The Lord answered that prayer and I felt relieved to know that Penn would get the help he needs to hopefully get him within that average range in the coming months (Yes, that's my new prayer, that this is just a hiccup in his development and not a larger speech issue similar to what we are dealing with for Tavin).  So, here we go again.  I'd appreciate your prayers for Penn that he would just thrive in therapy, that it would be fun for him and that we would see progress even in the near term.  

One final note.  I write this on the blog and I wonder, is this OK that I'm sharing this?  Will Penn be offended someday that I did?  (Believe me, although I share a lot on the blog, there's plenty I don't just for reasons like that).  This blog is my journal, my thoughts, but it does reach a broad audience, so I like to check myself before I publish personal posts such as this one.  As I was chatting with a new mom yesterday and somehow stumbled into updating her about Penn's situation I felt a little bit of shame.  As if I did something wrong, as if she would judge me or even worse, my son, because of this need for services.  But this is why I share this post with you today.  There is no reason to be ashamed.  There is no reason I or my son should be judged.  This is life.  We all have strengths, we all have weaknesses.  Wrestling through those makes us stronger while keeping us humble.  I'm a good mom and it's evidenced by getting the help my kids need when they need it and not worrying about what others think.  It's because I love them no matter what and I want them to be prepared for the world they will one day walk through without holding my hand.  So, dear Penn, I share this because you are who you are and I love every little thing about you and I am privileged to walk this new journey with you.