Originally Posted by La Texican
Now I feel silly about all the hedging I did on my last post. Espers used a sentence "I want it" with her hand out at the dinner table to get something from her dad. I've heard a couple of times that I thought she was making a sentence. But I know babies sound like they're talking before they actually do. And I know that babies talk before people realize they're really talking. This probably isn't even the right thread to put this in. (^.^') -(embarrassed emoticon)

I had to go back and read about the echolalia to see what you were talking about. Butter was absolutely communicating with us well before her 1st bday. We taught her some simple signs like more, milk, sleep, etc so she used those, but, beyond that...for many months, probably as young as 8-10 months, she would push away food, books, whatever, and say what sounded like "monkey shoes". We didn't know what she was saying, but the meaning was clear. At that point, would you call that talking? I didn't, but she was communicating and we could tell it meant "no more" or I'm done...this child was never very chatty though...fast foward to about 20 months, when her physicality caught up to her intellect and suddenly we realized she had been saying "No thank you" all that time! Maybe the phrasing was echolalia, but when the context is correct after a few times, it becomes apparent that it's not a fluke, the child IS talking!


I get excited when the library lets me know my books are ready for pickup...