The Results

 For some time now, I've been worried about Kodi's speech.  At 18 months she was right now track, but hasn't really added any new words to her vocabulary since then.  In fact, she even seemed to go backwards for a time and not even using the few words she did know.  At her 2-year check-up, I asked about her speech and her pediatrician said that many two-year-olds will suddenly start talking.  because she has been a little late with everything, I've been hoping her speech would follow the pattern, but it's not.  She's nearly two and a half and still only says a handful of words.

I finally decided to call Early Intervention to have her tested.  This is the same program Kyson went through for speech therapy and then qualified for the preschool.  Kodi's testing clearly showed she qualified for the program.  In order to be in the average range a child should be between 16 and 84.  Anything below 7 would qualify Kodi for therapy with Early Intervention.  Her numbers were as follows:

Adaptive (self-help) = 27
Personal-Social = 47
Receptive Communication = 5
Expressive Communication = <1
Gross Motor = 63
Fine Motor = 63
Cognitive = 7

She qualified in three areas and her communication is so low that unless there is significant improvement in the next 6 months, we're looking at the preschool program, weekly speech therapy, and an IEP like Kyson.

While I'm incredibly grateful for the services that are available and the knowledge we have to know when there is a problem, but I don't understand why both of our children are having this serious speech delay.  I hope that with their help and our time, we'll be able to help both of our children speak without problems, and not have in impediments that will affect them the rest of their lives.