A Bit More Background

So what, you may ask is Abby like? First of all, she is funny and loving and your typical three year old in many ways. What makes her different then? Abigail can say many words but her actual "language development" is behind. It is difficult to have a conversation with her. She can answer yes and no questions as well as this or that, but ask her an open ended questions and most likely she will repeat it right back to you. Me: "Abby, how was school?" Abby: "How was school?". Me: "Abby what do you want for Christmas?" Abby: "Christmas". While this is very normal for younger children, it is not normal for children her age. She also tries to use more complex sentences but it becomes gibberish. So she may say, Mommy, can na na na na  Chic fila. She uses na to fill in words that she can't say or doesn't know (we aren't sure which is happening).

Abigail also becomes very easily frustrated. She wants to be independent but if something is difficult, we are in for some screaming. She is also a particular child. She wants things done a certain way. If you put her coat on, you better button all the buttons or she will get very upset. Screaming is a hobby of hers. If her baby sister gets close to her toys, scream. If you try to put on a pair of shoes she doesn't want to wear, scream. If she is in a weird mood, scream. In fact, she has given her baby sister screaming lessons and now my 10 month old thinks screaming is fabulous. When Abigail is upset it is VERY hard to understand her. This leads to her becoming more upset because she can't explain what she wants.

Abby is also not very social. She is very shy and somewhat skeptical of strangers (this I don't mind nor do I think is abnormal as her old sister was the same way). She does like to play on her own quite a bit but does a very great job copying her older sister when she is in the mood.

On her strengths, she is very smart. She knew all of her upper and lower case letters by the time she was 18 months old. She could barely say anything else, but she knew those letters. She knows her numbers and her shapes and colors. When you read her a book or let her watch a movie, she will have it memorized in no time.  In fact, she uses phrases from movies quite a bit. She also is the cuddliest little girl. She loves to give hugs to all of us and to snuggle.

So where are we now with her progress? She saw the psychologist on November 29th. We were given a diagnosis by mid December. We went to the public school system to inquire about her eligibility for services on December 13th (this just happens to be my birthday). She was then formally evaluated on January 3rd (this happens to be my brother's birthday) by the school system. We will hopefully know their impressions of her sometime later in this month or early next month.

In the meantime, I found out that Abby's insurance will pay for speech therapy and occupational therapy. I am excited about this because it means extra help for Abigail. I was concerned that she wouldn't be started in therapy with the school system until April and then when the summer comes her therapy would stop until the next school year. With private therapy, she can start sooner and continue through the summer. We are on a waiting list with our local children's hospital for both.

I am also looking into ABA (Applied Behavioral Analysis). This therapy is scientifically proven to help children like Abby to be able to function more normally. Of course it is very costly and insurance does not pay for it in the state of Virginia. So for now we will start the other therapies.

A last note, Abby is like most children. She has good days where her differences are not that apparent and bad days when it is clear she needs help and we need help as her parents. I love her and I know God has a special plan for her life!