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From: Nick Ingram
Date: 10/7/00
Time: 6:35:36 AM
Remote Name: 152.163.213.201
Our 2 and a half year old daughter just started what looks like mild stuttering. She stayed with her grandparents for 4 nights without my wife and I for the first time last week. Whle there she started having trouble saying her "w's". So, on the phone she said to me "Wh..wh..what are you doing, daddy?" (She was doing this with the grandparents when we weren't on the phone as well.) Since coming back to our place and resuming her normal routine the stuttering has remained. She is saying things like: "I can't say it". It's obviously frustrating her. She has been a very good speaker compared to her peers till this point,but now we are noticing that she is using shorter sentences and one or two words only, where previously she would have used a longer sentence. She obviously avoiding words she has trouble with, particularly questions she used to ask all the time like "Where is ...". This change has made my wife and I think about two of her other speech patterns. Firstly, she has always lengthened the middle syllable in some words. She says "mooon" instead of "moon", for example. Secondly, she often says words twice, especially adjectives. For example, she says "special special treat", and "I want another nother one" or "I put it up high high". What's really got us worried is this sudden back step in her speaking, particularly her reluctance now to speak sentences that she would have handled easily until a week ago. Her obvious concern about this is also worrying. (By the way we have tried really hard not to make a big thing about this in front of her). I've looked on the net and there seem to be normal "speech disfluencies" at her age. Is it likely that this is all it is? Should we go to see an SLP? And is the Lidcombe programme based in Lidcombe in Sydney Australia? If so should we get in touch with them, given we live only 10 minutes away. Also, what can we do at home? I noticed on the net one suggestion to talk in shorter sentences to your child. I've always talked to her in the same way and using the same vocabulary as I might to an adult. Is this not a good idea?
Many thanks Nick