Finding your way

A while ago, when we were starting out looking for therapy classes, we found a speech and language therapist to help with Ren’s communication. At this point, he was 3 plus nearly 4 and still struggled to speak and communicate to us what he needs. 

Before I go on about this experience, what I want parents to take away is that, there is always going to be trial and error involved, we should be flexible to change, be demanding (in a good way) in the sense of being clear what you need from the therapist and coming to an understanding that the working relationship may not work. Sometimes I find that meeting a therapist that doesn’t work for your child, makes it easy to form a judgement on the entire experience, and concluding that this type of therapy doesn’t work. 

At this point when I started therapy, I was already quite clear on what I wanted Ren to achieve, and during his time in Early intervention, although he made great progress, communication was still a struggle, he could not speak and only managed a couple of words. He was stimming quite abit, and tends to make sounds with his mouth to express an emotion. 

To begin with, due to scheduling, I asked to make an appointment with any Speech and Language therapist (SLT) that would fit the schedule. I remember the exercises she did was very tied to standard practices, what I mean by this is that the activities were basically followed via a guide. There was not much personal input I felt that she put into the lessons (but then again that could just be my assumption). She also “interpreted his action” incorrectly. I clearly remember once, she insisted that he would like the cookie as an incentive, however I knew that the cookie did not incentivise him at all and that he really wanted to leave because he missed his auntie (our helper who was waiting outside). As he ignored the therapist’s request to do the activity and started banging on the door to go out, the therapist then proceeded  to tell me that “See, he wants the cookie but he is doing something completely different, like banging on the door”. At that point this was quite the obvious red flag to me that she clearly makes very sweeping assumptions without trying to understand the child, their motivations and interests. 

Besides the above experience, I shared that Ren loved dinosaurs and plays with it mostly. She proceeded to mention that we should steer him away from dinosaurs as he is not real and mostly pretend, and he should play more real life situation type of games. To her credit, I believe she was doing the best she thought she could be. But my point here is that, as parents because we do not have the expertise doesn’t mean we can’t tell when something doesn’t seem right for our child. I often tell myself to trust the doctors, therapists because I don’t know better. however, I am so glad I kept pushing myself to find out more and learn, and that’s where I found Ren’s speech therapist, who also coached me on the Hanen way of communication. 

Chemistry is important, we shouldn’t down play that. Yes, therapists credentials are also important, but what I find is that, a therapist who is passionate, confident and inspirational would find creative ways to help a child and also integrate their interests and communication style. 

Sharing below, some of the pieces that Ren created. Being expressive and showing creativity in some of the books that he read with his therapists.