James had his well-baby appt today since he turned 18 months a few days back (I know I need to post about it, we've been busy!). The doctor says he looks very healthy, his weight percentile is up to 30% instead of 15%, so that's good. He also is developing just fine physically.
The bad thing, though, is she is as concerned about him only saying "dada" as I am. She says he should have 5-10 words by now, and he only has one, plus a few in sign language. So she is recommending he get evaluated by the Early Intervention speech therapists to see if he qualifies for the program to help small children in their language development. They say if they catch problems early on, it makes a huge difference for kiddos. So I'm all for it.
The truly good news is James does NOT have the major warning signs for autism. The doc pointed at something at the wall and was excited about it, and James turned to look at it... she said with autistic kids, they don't get excited or curious about what strangers are excited about, so with that test they wouldn't look where she was pointing. But James is super social and loves to play games. He was so excited about being around the doctor, he even sat on her lap and helped her type things in the computer. :-) He also was sad when both the nurse and doctor left the room... I think he just likes new people.
So not autistic. But maybe speech delayed. She said it is possible for him to catch up and just start talking one day, but she said when they don't even have 2 words by 18 months, they usually like to check it out. We might also get his hearing checked at some point to make sure he is hearing all the frequencies and ruling that out as a problem.
I hope he just surprises me and starts gabbing away one of these days.
Stats for 18mo appointment:
Weight: 23lbs (30th percentile)
Hieght: 31 inches (15th percentile)
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