Another step
Literally.
The occupational therapist came along for the ride with Kay the speech therapist yesterday, to take a good look at Tad.
As a result, Tad will be getting orthopedic inserts for his shoes.
This doesn’t really relate to speech therapy at all, you say. Why inserts?
Well, Tad walks on his tiptoes. Constantly. When I initially heard that it is one of the “symptoms” of autism, I wondered and worried. When autism was ruled out for Tad, I just chalked it up to him being him.
It turns out Tad has flat feet and that it does happen that kids with flat feet tiptoe a lot. He also, in the therapist’s opinion, shows signs of pronation of the feet. This apparently has never impeded his ability to walk – the therapist even commented that he was “quite speedy.” Since Tad started walking at nine and a half months, his feet have never concerned me. But the insert that they will order for him will force his heel down, making him walk on his whole foot and potentially giving him more balance.
In the meantime, the occupational therapist’s recommendation was to keep Tad moving “to wear him out.”
Well, no kidding. How do you think I survive around here?
Kay was pleased with Tad’s progress this last week, and wanted him to continue working on his hard consonant sounds and straw exercises (to force his mouth into an “o” shape).
So, after I picked Ane up at Grandma’s, we took Grandma and Auntie to Ane’s preschool “art show” (where each class produces art for display, so each child has one piece displayed) and then out to dinner at Red Robin (the Webmaster wasn’t home from work yet, but we ordered him a burger to go), where Tad got in plenty of “straw work” with his milk. And he did a pretty good job! My mom and I could actually see him swallowing as he sucked – a very good sign.
“Whoever thought using a straw would be so important for him?” Grandma wondered.
I sure never did.
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