Wednesday, May 23, 2012

Nate's Words

On this lovely spring day, I find myself inside at the computer writing a blog update.  Why?  Well, there are no rainy days in the forecast, and we've had some exciting progress with Nate and his talking.  No, he's not talking in sentences yet, but we've gotten a few words out of him in the last week or two and we're pretty pumped!  On Sunday night we were sitting on the front porch at Mom and Dad VD's, and through an open window we could hear our kids who had just been put to bed in one of the front bedrooms.  Nate was getting annoyed with bedtime, and started calling "Mama!  Mama!".  Even though he was a little upset, I heartily enjoyed listening to him calling me for the first time.  He is also saying "hi", occasionally "hi Dad", "amen" after we pray, and when he feels like it "night night".  Last night he also started filling in "go" after we said "ready, set...". 
It's not exactly remarkable news for anyone else, especially when there are a lot of 20 month-olds out there who have quite a repertoire of words, but we are excited to see him finally starting to repeat things and try new sounds.  Peter was probably at around the same point as Nate when he was 14 or 15 months, and Aaron slightly earlier at about 13 or 14 months.  Most of the noises Nate makes are from the back of the throat and don't require a lot of effort to make.  I have a feeling it has something to do with his refusal to drink when he was younger.  It makes sense to me that later development of his "suck and swallow" muscles would correspond with his delay in vocalization, as well as the persistent cough and difficulty in clearing his throat.  We've got an appointment at the end of June with a respirologist in Hamilton to see what they have to say, but I have a feeling it's going to just be a wait and see thing, and that he'll grow out of it as he practices his sounds and his swallowing, and strengthens those muscles.  In the meantime, keep those words coming, Nate!  

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