# Chateau de la Tobler

## Wednesday, December 16, 2009

### Jayson

I honestly don't know how much of this any of you know (except for Mom and Keryn, who know it all), so I'm going to start at the beginning. We noticed a few months ago that Jayson wasn't talking at all yet and we started to get a little concerned. Not too much, but a little. Katy was slow in starting to talk, but she had a few words from about 18 months on. Jayson didn't have any words at all. After Brooke was born, a "welcome home" nurse came over to our apartment to go over the different resources available to us for her. While she was here, I mentioned that Jayson didn't have any words and we were starting to get concerned. She told me about Kids Who Count. I had heard of them before (because Gideon works with them), but I didn't know they did speech stuff too, so I was excited to learn about it. I called them and started the ball rolling on getting Jayson the help he needed.
After about 3 months, the swine flu, and busy schedules (including the holidays), we've finally managed to see everyone we need to in order to start Jayson on regular therapy. He saw a speech therapist, a behavioral therapist, and an occupational therapist. Obviously, the speech therapist, Cynthia, will be working with him on his speech. The occupational therapist, Mary, will be helping us get him to eat a better variety of foods (right now, all he'll eat are salty, crunchy foods, like chips, fries, and crackers, and also apples and a very specific type of bread). We will be seeing the behavioral therapist, Melanie, the most, though. It turns out that Jayson is testing younger than he is, about a year younger on average. Melanie will be coming once a month, just like the other two, to work with him one on one for 45 minutes, but he will also be starting group therapy in January. The playgroup will meet once a week. During each group, half the time will be spent with all the kids (siblings included) and the other half of the time, Jayson and I will work with the other kids, their parents, and Melanie, while all the siblings (Brooke included) will go with the 'sibling helpers' to play.
I have to admit that after they told me where he was, I was shocked. I knew that he needed help with speech and I was a little concerned with his social skills, but I didn't think he was that bad. They used "autistic tendencies" a lot when they were talking about him with me, and that scared me even more. After calming down about it and talking with various people (Mom, Keryn, and Samuel included), I feel a lot better about it. I know it's going to take a lot of work, but I also know that Jayson is a smart boy. He's going to need more help and attention than Katy has needed, but that's okay. I just wanted to let everyone know where we are on this and what we're doing. I'm excited to see how he progresses when we really get started going in January. He's already showing progress with the little extra things we've been doing with him lately. He's starting to actually communicate, non-verbally, but communicate nonetheless. He'll point to what he wants sometimes, he'll bring me the bag of chips that he wants to eat, he'll run to fridge when I ask him if he wants milk. It's a lot more than he used to do and we're excited about it. He is a very special little boy.
So, there you go. I just wanted to keep you all updated. I can't wait to see most of you while we're in Vegas. I hope that everyone is having a great holiday season! I love you all and MERRY CHRISTMAS!

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