Aidan

I received some amazing news this morning.

Aidan's speech therapist started with Aidan back when he was still doing a bunch of repeating people's questions back to them... it's called echolalia.  It's a symptom that is common among young children with conditions like epilepsy.  His brain was keeping him from communicating what he wanted, and what came out instead, was just a repeat of what the other person said.

I've mentioned before, that I knew just because Aidan did this, didn't mean he didn't realize what was going on or being said.  I knew he knew exactly what others were saying and doing.

His speech therapist told me that she had always read a series of stories to him during that time when the echolalia was really bad.  This morning, she pulled them out.  He told her, "We've already done those, those are old."  So she asked him if he remembered what happened in the stories.  

He proceeded to tell her the stories from memory.

He remembers all of it, perfectly.

So just because a child may appear to not really be here with us, "in their own little world," does not mean they are.

This is great news for Aidan.  It means that even if I feel (like I did this last week) like Aidan isn't getting something... he might really still be getting it, just can't communicate he gets it.  This gives me much needed reminding that what I'm doing is so worth it.  Even if I never hear him repeat back something from memory like that, at some point sometime, it's clicking.  And he won't ever truly lose that.