I had my first face to face parent teacher conference yesterday. There have been two conference periods since Ayden has started daycare, but at those times he was still adjusting to everything so we just wanted to give him more time and weren’t too worried about hitting certain milestones. Now that his speech/language development is still delayed I thought it best to actually talk to the teacher about it. She really pushed for an in-person meeting.
They use these documents of milestones for specific age groups. Ayden’s meeting focused on what typically developing students should be doing at 42 months. The majority of his development is typical. He actually potty trained really fast. He was completely trained in a month, only 3 months after turning 2. And his gross motor skills are extremely strong. He is STRONG. Let me tell you this kid can do pull ups and push ups and when he grabs me, sometimes I feel like one of those bear traps got me.
Ayden definitely talks more at home, but he’s more clingy and dependent on me, because I’m his mom. For some toddlers, mama is everything so the school and home environment cannot compare.
At school he doesn’t talk during meals, he doesn’t ask for certain things that the other kids do, and he doesn’t tell stories or use abstract language in the way other kids can. For the first 2 years of my son’s life he heard and used Korean language, so there has been a huge language barrier for him. And English pronunciation is difficult for him. When he says “dinosaur” it sounds something like “binofour.” “Cold” sounds like “poll” and “you’re welcome” is something like “gugeckum.” I mean the kid is trying.
Humor is also one of his coping mechanisms when he can’t use language properly. If he doesn’t know a word on a flashcard or in a book, he will goofily say it’s cake. If he doesn’t know how to respond to something he will do something silly like put his shirt over his head, or throw a tantrum in frustration. Could be toddler behavior, could be the speech delay.
I often wonder if his speech delay has something to do with something that happened in utero. His birth mom smoked and drank for 5 month because she didn’t know she was pregnant until then. We’re in the process of adopting our second child so we’re doing more trainings. I recently learned about some effects of fetal alcohol spectrum disorder. I’m not sure Ayden has it, but maybe that language part of the brain was somehow hindered in his infancy.
I share many of the struggles that biological parents have, however we have the addition of factors common in the adoption world. Korea is a modern nation with advanced healthcare system, and we have a full health history on our son. But there are only a few pieces we know about his birth parents. So who knows what issues may arise that could have biological or genetic reasoning. I have vertigo and dizzy spells, which I know I get from my dad. If Ayden develops conditions like this we might not know where it comes from. In addition, Ayden suffered the trauma of being separated from his foster family. They are great people and I hope we get to meet them again one day.
I guess all parents live with unknowns, uncertainty and are trying to figure it out. However I wish there could be some additional training to educational staff about issues adopted kids might carry.
Adopting After Infertility 