Carter Isn't Speaking: Part II

Last time I sat down to write about Carter's speech development I felt like we were going nowhere fast. Carter was being SO stubborn about not talking and I was getting frustrated. It's amazing what a few weeks can truly do, because since the last post we've hit a major breakthrough!

Ahh... it feels so good to write that.

See that? Aside from the growling, which I find endlessly adorable right now, Carter has been sprouting new words left and right.

Last week, before the boys left for their week-long Grandma-Palooza, we had put both boys to bed like normal. Carter has always been a great sleeper, so it was quite odd when at 10:30 he woke up crying. Their dad went up first and he was screaming for me, so finally I went up. I could tell he just wanted to hang out, so I did what I rarely ever do and let him stay up for a little while.

After we brought Carter downstairs with us, he was walking around pointing at everything. He was laying on top of me and he'd point at the chair and I'd say chair, then he'd repeat it. This happened about 5-6 times and I was starting to be quite blown away. It became a game quickly. When he would point at something and say "ugh!" (meaning "What is this, Mama?") I would repeat "Whats that?" until he started saying "Whassat?" then, once he said "Whassat" I would say the name of the item he was pointing at. Quickly he'd move onto another item, but I'd stop him and redirect him back to the previous item until he said its name.

This went on for about 30 minutes!

Half an hour of my baby -- who never ever speaks -- speaking! I think deep down I knew we'd have a breakthrough like this, where all of a sudden he'd just start speaking instead of repeating everything, but it feels SOOOOO good now that it has happened. I can stop stressing a wee bit.

Now almost two weeks later and Carter is saying many words on his own. He's starting to say "Please" and "thank you" on his own and he is actively pointing things out. I truly believe he just needed some more one on one time, because his everyday life is full of his brother's giant personality he literally couldn't get a word in!

I'm still looking forward to (eventually, holy mother of batman this is taking forever!) getting him into a speech development/assessment because his pronunciation is way off sometimes and his speech in general kind of sounds like someone who is deaf speaking. I'm wondering if his hearing is off at all and definitely going to be getting that checked out (again.)

Anyways, big hip hip hoorays over here and I hope life is treating you well.

xo C