Willow & Sebastian spent the day with Gramma & Papa today. They went out for breakfast, where they both devoured stacks of pancakes. After that they went home & turned Gramma & Papa's living room into a haunted house! It took me all of three minutes to get Willow to sleep tonight. That alone tells me that they had a very awesome day.
Such excitement splashed into our world today! It was happiness mixed with a huge sigh of relief. Today we took Judah for a music therapy consult in Portland. Yah, it was a bit of a drive but it was definitely well worth it. We spent 45 minutes with a woman who taught us that there are people out there who can work beautifully with children & are incredibly prepared with a mix of wonder & motivation to help kids progress in different areas. These are people that LOVE their jobs. Her strumming the guitar & singing was a bit over stimulating for him at first, but it didn't take long before he pulled his head out of my lap & began to explore. This woman knew what she was doing. She would transition him from one instrument to the next, keeping his attention fresh & his motivation strong. She sat on the floor with him (staying at his level). He LOVED all of the instruments & was so creative with them, which she seemed to enjoy a lot. After watching him for a while she let us know, in a very genuine way, that he was obviously a brilliant engineer. I've never heard anyone (besides family) talk about our son in such a positive, admiring way. She looked at him & saw strengths not weaknesses. She got to know him through music & playing as well as asking us questions about him along the way. She seemed genuinely interested in Judah, passionate about her work and very good at it. She would play an instrument while singing a song. Sometimes these songs were well known children's songs. Sometimes she would stop and see if he would fill in the word. Other times she would stop when she could see that his attention was going elsewhere. At that point she would engage in his current interest (which is very important) & work from there. She had asked me a week prior about his interests & favorite songs so she could work them into the session. Unfortunately I emailed her back last minute with that info, so she wasn't able to do that today. She used her I-pad while she played on the piano. She used a letter app, had him pick a letter & then she would play the piano & sing a short melody about that letter. In every instant of that session she was teaching, in many different ways. It was so cool to see. Judah played, he enjoyed the music, he learned how to use different instruments, he had new curiosities and new discoveries every minute he was there. He absolutely loved it. There's no doubt in my mind that speech progress could be made for him there. He was using words & making sounds during the session. She has free music therapy sessions with kids once a month in Portland. We've already signed up. She will work from the studio (where we were today) or from her mother's basement in Aurora if it gives a customer a shorter drive. She charges on a sliding scale, so price depends on what works for your financial situation. Like I said, she is passionate about her work. She has a few music therapy degrees, some pretty impressive experience & work titles, but she doesn't seem to let any of that get to her head. Working with her today put hope in my heart that we may have found a venue Judah could happily progress from. It was a great day.
Music therapy is still pretty limited. I don't understand why though. We could only find one music therapist in Salem & it looked like she was focused in a lot of different directions, not just on music. I've recently found communities of music therapists online. Did you know that you can get a doctorate in music therapy? I predict it will become a strong form of therapy once more & more people discover it. From what I've read, it sounds like it's something that could work wonders for Judah. Speech & music actually overlap as they both work a certain area of your brain. There have been studies done that show that nonverbal kids like Judah will have LESS activation in that area of the brain through speech stimulation and MORE activation through song stimulation. Today I saw that in motion. It was pretty amazing.
We went to Einstein Bagel's after the music session & Judah had the worst bloody nose I have ever seen. He continues to be constipated, no bowel movements at all today.
ps- I'm sorry this entry is not edited. I was just excited and wanted to share!
Such excitement splashed into our world today! It was happiness mixed with a huge sigh of relief. Today we took Judah for a music therapy consult in Portland. Yah, it was a bit of a drive but it was definitely well worth it. We spent 45 minutes with a woman who taught us that there are people out there who can work beautifully with children & are incredibly prepared with a mix of wonder & motivation to help kids progress in different areas. These are people that LOVE their jobs. Her strumming the guitar & singing was a bit over stimulating for him at first, but it didn't take long before he pulled his head out of my lap & began to explore. This woman knew what she was doing. She would transition him from one instrument to the next, keeping his attention fresh & his motivation strong. She sat on the floor with him (staying at his level). He LOVED all of the instruments & was so creative with them, which she seemed to enjoy a lot. After watching him for a while she let us know, in a very genuine way, that he was obviously a brilliant engineer. I've never heard anyone (besides family) talk about our son in such a positive, admiring way. She looked at him & saw strengths not weaknesses. She got to know him through music & playing as well as asking us questions about him along the way. She seemed genuinely interested in Judah, passionate about her work and very good at it. She would play an instrument while singing a song. Sometimes these songs were well known children's songs. Sometimes she would stop and see if he would fill in the word. Other times she would stop when she could see that his attention was going elsewhere. At that point she would engage in his current interest (which is very important) & work from there. She had asked me a week prior about his interests & favorite songs so she could work them into the session. Unfortunately I emailed her back last minute with that info, so she wasn't able to do that today. She used her I-pad while she played on the piano. She used a letter app, had him pick a letter & then she would play the piano & sing a short melody about that letter. In every instant of that session she was teaching, in many different ways. It was so cool to see. Judah played, he enjoyed the music, he learned how to use different instruments, he had new curiosities and new discoveries every minute he was there. He absolutely loved it. There's no doubt in my mind that speech progress could be made for him there. He was using words & making sounds during the session. She has free music therapy sessions with kids once a month in Portland. We've already signed up. She will work from the studio (where we were today) or from her mother's basement in Aurora if it gives a customer a shorter drive. She charges on a sliding scale, so price depends on what works for your financial situation. Like I said, she is passionate about her work. She has a few music therapy degrees, some pretty impressive experience & work titles, but she doesn't seem to let any of that get to her head. Working with her today put hope in my heart that we may have found a venue Judah could happily progress from. It was a great day.
Music therapy is still pretty limited. I don't understand why though. We could only find one music therapist in Salem & it looked like she was focused in a lot of different directions, not just on music. I've recently found communities of music therapists online. Did you know that you can get a doctorate in music therapy? I predict it will become a strong form of therapy once more & more people discover it. From what I've read, it sounds like it's something that could work wonders for Judah. Speech & music actually overlap as they both work a certain area of your brain. There have been studies done that show that nonverbal kids like Judah will have LESS activation in that area of the brain through speech stimulation and MORE activation through song stimulation. Today I saw that in motion. It was pretty amazing.
We went to Einstein Bagel's after the music session & Judah had the worst bloody nose I have ever seen. He continues to be constipated, no bowel movements at all today.
ps- I'm sorry this entry is not edited. I was just excited and wanted to share!
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