When most parents are putting away the decorations from a first birthday party and diving into the throes of toddlerhood, Benjamin’s were dealing with the devastation of a diagnosis: Childhood Apraxia of Speech. Apraxia is a motor speech disorder that first becomes apparent just as a very young child is learning speech. These children have great difficulty planning and producing the precise, highly refined and specific series of movements of the tongue, lips, jaw and palate that are necessary for intelligible speech. His parents were told that in the worst case scenario, Benjamin might never speak and that, best case scenario, after years of intense therapy, he might be a verbal communicator by kindergarten. They remarked, “We were devastated by the diagnosis and the days following were very scary for our family.”
But as Benjamin prepares to blow out four candles on his cake this summer – his parents write to us –
“Today we celebrate-Benjamin is testing at age for his speech. It is truly beyond what we dared to dream. We had set the goal of thirty words by age three. His progress was steady but rapid. He seemed to gain new words and sounds almost daily. By age three, Benjamin said hundreds of words. We were able to enroll him in a typical preschool last fall, where he has thrived. We wholeheartedly believe that Benjamin’s speech therapist, was one of the reasons that Benjamin was able to beat the odds. She was able to make therapy fun for him and was so flexible with our little two year old boy. She was skilled at finding fun games that he enjoyed playing and incorporating the therapy into those activities. We are incredibly grateful to our speech therapist and Columbus Speech &Hearing. She gave our son a voice when no one else could and her dedication to his success was obvious. From the bottom of our hearts, thank you.”