I wanted to give you the best answer possible, so I asked an information office friend for some suggestions for you, as well as other professionals who attended the Know Your Rights Night.

I hope these replies are helpful for you:

Information Officer:
I would usually say to parents that if they can identify someone in their local community – or a family member – they can approach the hse team and ask that this person be employed – subject to interview and all the usual garda checks. This has worked in the past – I have done it twice to ensure my own home help hours were delivered – however I would also say that with the freeze on hse taking on more staff this may not now be possible – but it’s worth asking!

Mum should also approach Downs Syndrome Ireland 01 4266500/1890374374 or Inclusion Ireland 01 85559891 and ask for an Advocacy Officer to take on her case and fight for delivery of the support she needs.

SLT:
If you are eligible for the Domiciliary Care Allowance maybe you could use that to pay for home support? You might have to find your own home support worker- I’d suggest posting on rollercoaster.ie as you might get other parents with advice for you there…

What kind of recommendations are you looking for? If you are looking for support, then Down Syndrome Ireland (www.downsyndrome.ie) is a good place to start. If you are looking for speech and language therapy, you can always ring us at 01-853-1578 or contact the IASLT at www.iaslt.com. There’s also Down Syndrome Education International at www.downsed.org . If you need more help and would like to talk to someone about what you’re looking for, please feel free to give us a bell.

the warning signs part of the article is helpful to see how “severe” your son’s stammering is right now. A researcher in Illinois completed several studies to help find out who recovers from stuttering and who continues to stutter. A greater percentage of boys continue to stutter over girls and if a parent stutters, but didn’t recover, then it’s a greater chance that the child will continue to stutter. Now, the recovering percentage is still high regardless. For instance, I continue to stutter and my 2 year old boy (at the time) went through a month of severe stuttering. He’s now 7 and completely fluent. So, read as much as you can at the BSA website from Anna and the Stutteringhomepage.com website.

Many two year olds stammer, and the majority of them will spontaneously recover from this stammering. I would suggest, though, that since you have a history of stammering, that you have your son evaluated by a speech and language therapist who can help determine the severity of the stammering. In the meantime, provide your son a model for slow, relaxed speaking, allow him to finish his own sentences whilst waiting patiently, and give everyone in the household the opportunity to say what they want without being talked over. If he does continue to stammer, it is important that he not begin to feel stressed over his stammering.

Best,
Jen

It is encouraging that your son does use words, but by the age of three, many children will be putting two to three word phrases together, and will be naming many things. A good hub of information for parents is on the American Speech-Language Hearing Association (ASHA)’s website at: http://www.asha.org/public/speech/development/chart.htm

If you are concerned for his language development, I would strongly suggest taking him for a speech and language evaluation. If you are in Ireland, you can contact your local HSE for a public appointment, or contact the Irish Association of Speech Language Therapists in Private Practice (www.iasltpp.com), or call Release for a private evaluation.

I would also highly recommend having him seen by an audiologist to assess his hearing. I would be happy to give you some names of audiologists in Ireland.

Also, if you are concerned your son has autism, please don’t wait to get him assessed. The sooner professionals can identify his needs, they can help you get to work on focusing on what services he should receive. Early intervention is KEY! A good autism assessment should be completed by a multidisciplinary team, consisting at LEAST of a clinical psychologist, speech and language therapist and usually an occupational therapist. Other teams would also have a social worker, educational psychologist, pediatrician, etc as well. In the US school districts many ASD evaluation teams also have a teacher of children with autism.

If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact us and we’ll be happy to give you whatever direction we can.

Best,
Jen