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Hello, friends,

In April, I stumbled upon this excellent article, An Open Letter to the Parent of a Child with Speech Delays. The piece was so thorough and helpful and seemed to be written precisely for Fiona’s situation (and seemed to address, with lots of compassion, all of my own feelings and initial responses to the idea of a speech device for Fiona) that I thought I’d share it with you. I also want to tell you where the advice has so far led us.

I’ve been following some of this advice since April, and while it has taken a long time to get an expert in Adaptive and Augmentative Communication in our home — because, as the article lays out, a lot of therapists aren’t trained in it — I’m pleased to say that just a few days ago, a wonderful speech therapist from several hours away came to visit Fiona and assess that INDEED, at just 2.5 years old, she is ready to move toward a speech talking device. You can read more about our visit with this therapist on our blog, here.

http://starinhereye.wordpress.com/2013/12/12/the-two-word-utterance/

The post celebrates a communication milestone for Fiona but also explains our beginning journey with AAC, or Augmentative and Adaptive Communication, and the hope we have for Fiona.

Here’s a photo of my happy, rascally girl.