Chance is now 22 ½ months old. Up until very
recently Chance has been one of the non-talkers. (da da da DUH!) (That was dramatic music, if you didn’t get
that.) That’s not to say he isn’t
verbal. He’s actually been extremely
verbal for a very looong time. In fact,
he’s been so verbal that for MONTHS we’ve been saying, “I think he’s about to
talk… OK, wait, now he’s about to
talk… No, really, NOW I think he’s gonna talk soon… …OK, he’s never, ever going to talk.” It’s just everything he says has been or is
in his own babble language. Even to the
point where I’ve started figuring out what his
words mean. (And trust me, some of them
don’t even sound close to their English equivalents, so it’s been a challenge.)

In general, I’ve been OK with Chance not talking. All kids develop at their own pace and I
didn’t want to push anything or hang over him all day inciting him to talk so
that he ended up in therapy years later bitterly discussing breastfeeding and
ABC blocks. (Plus, I really don’t have
the time to be that neurotic.) I’ve done
the gentle, occasional encouraging of words they say to do, I read to him a
lot, sing songs with him (and the TV), tried making talking fun and I’ve left
it at that. 

But it IS… and I know that every other parent who has gone
through this understands… frustrating! 

It’s frustrating not knowing what he wants. It’s frustrating listening to him speak very
intently and sincerely and wanting to understand
his story! And for me, when he
completely loses patience and devolves into whining, it’s frustrating that I
can’t scratch my ears off. (I really
don’t handle whining well. (You know,
except my own.))

But now (no, really… now) he’s finally saying some real… English… words. Among his impressive (hardy har) vocabulary
are the words “car”, “clap”, “down”, “uh-oh”, and (of course) “no”. Oh, and “mom”, “dad”, “Ja-ja” (Jake the cat),
and “Ssss” (Missy, the other cat) have been in play quite some time. Just the other day I even managed to get him
to say “more” when he wanted more juice instead of grunting at me, but in
general he won’t say any of the more typical and useful baby words, such as
“hi/bye”, “milk”, “help”, “change my diaper, I crapped!”, or other practical
phrases.

Though I will admit, I suspect that he could say a lot more
if he so chose. I suspect that instead of throwing tantrums or saying “no” to
everything, Chance’s negativism is coming out in a refusal to talk. As evidence there have been a number of times
Keen and I both have heard him talk when he doesn’t think we’re listening… then
Chance stops when he sees us. And… he also
gets this look, see. This stubborn – as
I’m trying to coax him into saying “more” or “juice” or anything else helpful –
set-in-his-ways look that says, “You can make me do a lot of things, lady, but you can’t
make me speak!” 

But now maybe…just maybe… have we turned a corner to a
kinder, more verbal household? 

I’m kind of hoping. – the weirdgirl