Such a slow and length process

Thinking about the last few months and the year I can see Josiah has made progress. At the beginning of the year he was so gripped by fear he couldn't carry out activities at school. Now with the help of the teachers, he is able to do most activities. But still is not able to speak at school. It is now October.

To be fair there is progress when before he couldn't speak at all in front of the teachers, he now can. Now he can speak in front of them, not totally comfortably but pretty well. He can answer questions by pointing so he is definitely progressing in the non verbal communication department. This I think helps when the school needs to find out if he understands something. If the teacher asks him a question he can sometimes answer the question to me. Which seems to work most of the time. And he is able to talk to other students when I am around as well. I have yet to find out if he talks to them on his own outside of the classroom.

Speech therapy now that is a different issue completely. His last appointment was months ago, and we haven't had any contact since. From my reading the speech therapist's have a lot to do with the progress of the children and are able to have a important role in their recovery. But up until now it has been quite pressure filled and I even feel the pressure for him to speak from the speech therapist. Which is difficult as we are trying to eliminate that pressure. Without the pressure it is different. For example in front of the occupational therapist, he has been able to talk quite quickly in front of her and not feel too pressured, it makes a huge difference. So we face the dilemma we can not get private speech therapy on our medical insurance but I think we are hitting a brick wall with the current therapist.

On the other hand the psychologist has been fantastic we are due to have another meeting with her this week. Which is the next step, next term it is really important we help Josiah prepare for the changes in next year for him. A larger class and different teachers. So the plan is to transition him in. First of all I need to work out what we want Josiah to be able to do in regards to speaking goals, non verbally and so on. Hopefully I can figure this out in my mind soon most importantly for the next appointment.