Regression - Autism Spectrum Message Board

Joey'smom · 01-28-2005, 02:15 PM

Have any of your children regressed verbally? Joey has been making remarkable progress this past year in speech. I would hate to think of going backwards.

edaisy80 · 01-28-2005, 04:52 PM

Caleb was developing pretty much the same as every other child when he was a baby. Then when he was about 11 months old he quite talking. I thought maybe it had to be the changes in his life. Like myself going to work and leaving him with a sitter. He lost all vocabulary but the word dad. And he would only say it when my husband picked him up from the sitter. But as of right now he's doing great. Sometimes he never is quiet. LOL Its ok though. Good luck to you and Joey.

Asperger family · 01-28-2005, 09:39 PM

I thought my son was regressing at age 4(im not sure what your childs age is) but my son started to speak at 3, one to two worded sentences and then to echolic speech for the next two years. He would speak 3-5 worded sentences, but alot of it was repetative speech. What we did, was try to keep the conversation going. So if he repeated something, we would just keep talking about the subject he was on, keep the subject moving forward, asking him questions even if he didnt answer right away or at all. His speech has smoothed over into normal speech...holds a longer conversation, ask questions and answers them, his speech is pretty normal now, he's not a social butterfly, but he does socialize now. He also used wrong words, like his name instead of "I" or he said "you", he never answered "yes" questions, many times he would ask the same questions I asked him. I was scared he would never talk right, but thank God he did learn. (he is 7) there seemed to be periods in this process, where he would do more handflapping(he doesnt do this anymore either)at times when he should have been speaking, he would get excited and start jumping up and down, it seemed he wanted to talk but couldnt get it out.His speech didn t come along smoothly, it came with in periods in the beginnings. I believe now, starting out speech, they are going to do alot of these things,but with time and speech therapy, this can be just a stepping stone into more normal speech. The best advice I can offer...is to be patient, speak slow(for processing) and encourage his conversations along while he is still learning speech, even if he is talking about the same thing all day...this seems to be a foundation for better speech in the future, but it has to be worked with and sometimes barriers have to be broken. It seemed before he would only talk about his obsessions or passions, like he was saving his breathe for what he really wanted to talk about, now he talks all the time about everything.Just today, I was talking to his teacher for about 20 minutes after school and he interrupted me and said"mom I want to leave...get me out of here." He was ready to go home...this is a kid who just over 4 years ago couldnt talk at all. God Bless and take care

Asperger family · 01-30-2005, 08:48 PM

I also wanted to add and Im sure most of you know this, for the ones who have speech or who are just learning how to speak..use the pecs or pax(whatever they call it) the picture cards. Have some at home too, they do help alot for autistic kids who have processing and speech problems, they can see the object they are talking about.

thorson · 01-31-2005, 12:28 PM

Our son is also in speech therapy through his school and he's talking much better and his vocabulary is huge he's at 80% grade level with speech.There's these pictures the school does use for his routine through out the school day and many autistic children/adults have them,it helps them get to know the regular routines at school.Even at home sometimes if not all the time you need to use these pictures too.Speech therapy is good even if the child isn't autistic but they need help with their speech there's someone who can teach the child at school besides the parents teaching their child at home.With care,Bonnie