I have come to the age in Layla's life where among every other role I play in her life, I must also be a mind reader!! The past week and a half I have really noticed a frustration on my part and hers with our ability to communicate to each other. She knows without a doubt what she wants but her ability to communicate these things to me is not good enough. Up to this point her use of sign language has been very effective but now Layla is more specific in her wants! The sign "eat" doesn't work when she wants a bagel and not eggs. The sign more "music" is not good enough when she wants to listen to Johnny Lang and not Dave Matthews!
Now when she comes to me and it is not clear as to what she is wanting, I either take her hand or pick her up and walk to the areas of my house waiting for more clues. At least I can pull things out of the refrigerator or pantry and she can shake her head yes or no. After playing the guessing game all day I am exhausted. Can anyone else relate to this with children around this age? ? All I know to do is keep asking her to use her words and tell me what she wants. She has become very good at repeating words and trying to say a lot of things that I do. Hopefully in the next couple of months her ability to communicate will get better. I am not usually one to hurry a stage but this one is hard! She gets frustrated and so do we! The positive side I guess is that I have a daughter who knows what she wants, she just has to learn how to say it! :)
~LK
It gets better. My son Tanner took longer to speak than my daughter. I had to stop and slow down and tell him to show me what he wants and then we say what he pointed to. He said "UUHH" and pointed so when I finally figured out what he ment, like "cup", I tried to get him to say the word. He didnt at first, but one day he just started talking!! This is where patience is really tested!!
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