speech delay -- advice please

My son will be 30 months december 24th and he only says a few words. the only words he says together is please dada (peese dada) and there is a pause between the please and dada. He also babbles a lot. He understands so much and answers yes and no to questions. He points to what he wants and also gets us when he wants something and brings us to what he wants. He is so smart and seems to be devolopmentally on track except with his speech. He has a hearing test on the 3rd of december and I am pretty sure he hears just fine he does not seem to have a hearing problem. we are doing testing to just kind of rule that out. His pedi reffered us to a speech therapist but they want like 200 an hour and at the evaluation the therapist said she wanted to see him once a week .. . we can not afford that!!! And insurance doesnt cover it!!
Has anyone else had a LO that has been speech delay? What was the outcome or are you going through something similar? It just seems like other kids his age are talking a lot more. He goes to daycare twice a week and gymboree once a week so he is around other kids. I don't know what to do with this situation. I thought my son was just fine until I noticed other toddlers talking and his pedi said he should be saying like 50 plus words by age two.. ugh so frustrating!

Look into ESD. My daughter is in a group of 4 kids that see a speech therapist weekly. Its free.

My oldest son was speeched delayed. The only thing I can think to recommend to you is look into state funded. Where we live at they offer it and it really worked for him.

My son is 26 months old and does not put words together. I'd say he has about 10-15 words he says and they are not clear. We go through early child intervention and it is free. He has a speech therapist and an OT both once a week. It does seem to help but it's only been a few weeks. He can't tell me what he wants or anything yet. His main words are ball,cow,more,star and things like that but they aren't clear.

Have you tried searching for non-profit organizations. I know allot of mamas on here have been able to find help for their kids for free once they are tested and deemed in need. Sometimes it's early intervention through the school system. I know I had an auditory processing problem and had to have speech therapy as a little kid around 2. My mom took me to the Scottish Rite Center not sure if they still exist but I do know there are some non-profits that should be able to help.

My son is 19 months and says no words at all. It is frustrating, I know. His doctor wanted him evaluated for autism just to rule it out and there's a company here called First Steps that does speech therapy and developmental intervention and he is now seeing them in our home twice a week for 45 minutes each visit. Once on Wednesdays with the developmental interventionist and once on Thursdays with the speech therapist. It has helped his communication (he wouldn't point or express a need for something in particular, just cry. Wouldn't answer yes or no or anything like that) but he still isn't saying any words. He IS using sign language now though, which they taught him. Our program is income based and covered by insurance though so it's free for us  

I'm not sure if they are a nationwide kind of company or just local. Everyone HERE knows them but I don't know many people with kids outside of town. Our son stays at home with us 24/7. He doesn't attend day care and has never been around other children longer than a couple of minutes. He's met one child his age and it was in a waiting room while I had blood work done.

Your son IS just fine. When our son's pedi first told us he wanted him evaluated for autism I flipped. my. smurf. I bawled for a full day thinking there was something wrong with him and blaming myself for not teaching him right or not doing everything perfect during my pregnancy and as it turns out, he just doesn't want to talk. Nothing wrong at all. They have literally diagnosed him "stubborn and independent" I wouldn't let this bother you too much. You can look up signs on youtube and start teaching those to him. Signing is easier than learning to talk and will help with any frustration. That's what most speech therapists would do anyway is teach him signs. It helps promote communication, which promotes speech. Just always say the word when you do the sign. That's all we do and now he uses nearly 10 signs and it's only been a couple of months  

im in the exact same boat as you are... Conan is 31 months.. and says a few words here and there.. our hearing test is on the 6th. we started teaching conan sign language about 4 months ago and it has helped SO much!!! im not taking him to speech therepy cause the cost and i just feel hes to young.

we live in santa maria.. how close are you guys to us?

Quoting Jae=Devin & Jordyns Mommy:" Have you tried searching for non-profit organizations. I know allot of mamas on here have been able to ... [snip!] ... to the Scottish Rite Center not sure if they still exist but I do know there are some non-profits that should be able to help."

Yes we had him evaluated at 24 months through a non profit center in our area. They said he was only 25% delayed in speech but everything else was right on track so he did not get accepted into the program.. I might try calling them again because they said he can be re-evaluated after 6 months.

Quoting Deborah B.:" im in the exact same boat as you are... Conan is 31 months.. and says a few words here and there.. our ... [snip!] ... him to speech therepy cause the cost and i just feel hes to young. we live in santa maria.. how close are you guys to us?"

Yep that is the same thing im going through! I am a little over 3 hours from you.

My son was 3 before he staarted putting words together. At first he woulod just say mama dada and the basics but then he stopped talking. My pedi said it was because he was a boy but i thought otherwise. I needed another way for my child to communicate with me so i started teaching him sign language! This was a life saver because he would sign to me what he wanted. He caught on really good but i did the signing with him to make it more fun. They have a show on PBS that does sign language as well, he loved that too. My son started preschool this year and i had him tested for speech and come to find out he has a severe phonological disorder and moderate/severe expressive/receptive disorder. They started him in speech therapy right away through his pre-school and will contiue to have speech classes, good thing is they said with classes it is 100% fixable!! Hes doing much better, but until you can obtain these services i would highly recommend sign language! Hope this helps!

<blockquote><b>Quoting Deborah B.:</b>" im in the exact same boat as you are... Conan is 31 months.. and says a few words here and there.. our ... [snip!] ... him to speech therepy cause the cost and i just feel hes to young. we live in santa maria.. how close are you guys to us?"</blockquote>




Hes not too young. My daughter started at 24 months. Its been very beneficial. Does make it hard when its so damn expensive.