The Power of Language

The New Guy (Bambam's neurological psychiatrist) is big on language development. As he put it "language is the key that unlocks everything". He's encouraged us to supplement the speech and language therapy that Bambam receives at school with private SLP on a weekly basis. We're getting this set up. But, in the mean time, we've had some evidence of how powerful language can be for a child like Bambam. Two very recent examples come to mind.

Last weekend Bambam was sick. Just a 24 hour thing, but fever, vomiting, stomach ache, you get the idea. In the past when Bambam has been sick and vomiting, he's been a disaster. It always included yelling, screaming, crying, flailing about, spitting, and general meltdown mode. There was no comforting him, he would be a disaster until he fell asleep. But last weekend we had a different sick kid. This one could tell us "I doan feew good". And even warned us with "I frow up, I frow up!". Like any mom, I felt terrible that my child was sick. But, I was also thrilled with this little boy who could TELL ME that he was sick. Being able to verbalize how he was feeling was amazing, a first, a huge step forward in his development. And it seemed to give him a sense of control. He wasn't yelling or crying or screaming and there was no melting down. Just a sick little boy laying on the couch saying "I doan feew good".

Then, later this week when I went to pick up Bambam from school, they were having a fire drill. And wow is that alarm LOUD. I could hear it 2 blocks away inside my car with the radio on. And I cringed. Fire alarms have always been a source of meltdowns for Bambam. In fact, the school has excused him from all fire drills since the first one his kindergarten year that traumatized him. I'm not sure how this one occurred without me getting a call to pick him up early and I was a little upset about that. I figured I was going to have a very long afternoon with a child close to meltdown stage for the rest of the day. But, as I waited for him to return to the building with his aid, what I saw amazed me. Here came this little boy holding Mrs. "E's" hand with no tears, no yelling, no melting down. When he saw me he said "is too loud, it scares me".  Um, WOW! The power of language. Just being able to say that it was too loud and scarey gave him the control he needed to be able to function in that situation.

New Guy is right, language is the key to unlocking everything.