Conversations with Colton

When Colton started pre-k back in August, I’ll admit I was worried. I’m pretty sure I cried every day those first few days. He would come home with some note about how he didn’t want to do the paper, or cried when the teacher tried to help him with his scissor skills. I’m not going to lie. I was so discouraged. Every time she sent home a note, the girls and I would do our best to work on that particular area with him at home. I kept telling Chuck, they’re going to kick him out. He just laughed and listened to my concerns. Thankfully, Colton has a teacher that wasn’t so easy to give up on him. I know those first few weeks were rough for both her and Colton. We are now on week nine, and he is doing fantastic! It’s been 4 weeks without a note sent home!

Colton’s speech has probably gone from a 2 1/2 year old to a 3 year old in the last 9 weeks. I’m so impressed with all the new words he has been bringing home. He still struggles with original thoughts, and tends to repeat when asked questions, but this is better than the silence we had before. I’ll take any improvement.

Yesterday when I picked him up from school, I went through the normal barrage of questions. He’s never really offered anything in return other than repeating words of what I’ve said or just ignoring me all together. Yesterday was different. When he got in the car, I asked him if he got green (the teacher has a color system red-naughty, yellow-warning, green – good). He normally doesn’t respond to this questions. Yesterday he said, “Yes! I got candy!” It couldn’t believe that he responded with an original thought.

After I get him in the car, we drive around the play ground to get into his brothers’ car line. I usually ask him if he played on the play ground and who he played with. Yesterday, before I got to ask him, he saw the playground and said, “I played on the playground. I played with Harrison. I played with Kennedy too.” I couldn’t believe it. I cried there in the car.

Most four year olds carry on normal conversations with their parents, siblings and friends daily. With speech delay, this is not the case. These small moments mean so much to me. I often hear, “Once he starts talking, you’ll wish he would shut up.” I hope this is NEVER the case. I hope I never take these conversations for granted.