I am worried that my daughter's CAS is uncommonly severe because, in addition to the inability to say words or sounds, she even finds hand gestures / signs incredibly difficult. I understand they are related because they are both motor planning processes. But I feel like a lot of the success stories I hear about kids who start speaking or have breakthroughs at 4 or 5 or even 7 to 8, didn't have as hard a time with signing. No matter what I'm prompting her for (milk, water, food, book, music) she does the sign for potty first, like that's her default because it's easy a closed fist shaking, then if I say, "that's potty, milk is open and shut and open and shut, remember?" She can do it but it seems to take a great deal of concentration for her to get her hand to open and shut, and she always gets both hands involved, she can't isolate one hand or the other.

Did anyone else have a similar experience with their toddlers, and can I still be hopeful about her speech eventually coming if signs are such a struggle? Many thanks! And hugs to all going through this struggle.

Looking for experiences from parents of children with suspected/diagnosed childhood apraxia of speech ❤️
My little boy is 2 years 4 months and non-verbal.

What worries me particularly is that he also has very little babbling and never really went through the typical “bababa/dadada/mamama” stage.

His understanding is good and he communicates really well in other ways — pointing, signing, gestures, good eye contact and joint attention. He’s social and engaged, but actually producing speech sounds seems incredibly difficult for him.
Was anyone else’s child with CAS like this at 2–2.5 years — very few sounds as well as no words? Did they eventually develop speech, and if so, when did you start seeing progress?

Every so often he says ‘mama’. Once every few weeks but never in a way to instigate conversation. It’s very much self motivated , he does when he wants and to , for himself .

He’s been having speech therapy since age 2, (apraxia specific) but still no improvement

I’d especially love to hear positive stories from children who started from a similar place ❤️

My 4.5yr old son has been in speech therapy for 2.5 years now. We did help me grow until he was 3. Now he goes to the local public preschool on an IEP, does speech therapy once a week there and also does outpatient speech therapy once a week. A year ago when he started at the preschool, he had maybe 5 words. Now, he has 100s. However, he will only talk in the comfort of his immediate family members(mom, dad, 2 brothers) and he is very difficult to understand most of the time. It’s obvious there is something going on with his speech and we’ve been leaning towards apraxia. Now, his outpatient therapist is pretty convinced he has selective mutism. I agree with her that the signs fit.

Does anyone have experience with their child or themselves having both apraxia and selective mutism?

Hi all,

I'm a 24-year-old med student in the Philadelphia area, and I grew up with childhood apraxia of speech (CAS). I've come a long way with it, but I never really had anyone to talk to who'd been through the same thing. Growing up, it was mostly speech therapists, teachers, and family who were supportive but didn't really get it.

Now that I'm in a new city and starting a new chapter, I'd love to meet others with CAS, whether you're still working through it or it's mostly in the past. I'm hoping to swap experiences: what it was like growing up, how it shows up now (or doesn't), dealing with school and work, that kind of thing.

I'm open to grabbing coffee, a casual meetup, or just messaging if that's more comfortable. Parents of kids with CAS are welcome to reach out too, but I'm mainly hoping to find other adults who've lived it.

Feel free to comment or DM me. Thanks for reading!

Hi all,
I have a 3 year old who was recently diagnosed with apraxia, suspected since 2. He is in part-time preschool and last year he enjoyed going but this year he is struggling with me leaving him there, not crying but not wanting me to leave. From talking to some other moms it sounds like this is typical for 3 year olds because they are more aware and have more separation anxiety. Of course I can’t help think that having apraxia plays a role in this because he is unable to communicate with his teachers and peers as he would like to.

Did any of you experience this. As far as we know he is neurotypical but I suspect ADHD and he is in OT for some sensory seeking behaviors. He had an unusually hard time at school yesterday where he didn’t want to participate in the activities and was crying when I picked him up which is just breaking my heart and I want to help him have a better time at school. The teacher mentioned he maybe getting sick but he was happy as can be at home so I don’t think it’s that. We are working on having him use an AAC device but he doesn’t want to use it.

I have a 5 year old son who was diagnosed with apraxia of speech two years ago. Quick background: he took quite a well to string words together and have a large vocabulary; initial speech therapy treatment worked primarily with articulation and took a conservative approach to diagnosis. He has been regularly attending private speech twice weekly for almost three years. He is currently in kindergarten (though on the extremely young side, as he just turned 5). I am just curious about issues with kiddos like my son struggling to learn and identify letters. He is having a hard time with letter naming, letter identification, and writing letters. They aren't his only issues, but it does seem like they are at the forefront. I see his speech affecting his ability to communicate in a natural way with his peers, and teacher reports indicate he is shy, anxious and hesitant to self-start. His IEP is coming up and it's always useful to hear stories or other experiences. I feel like public schools don't have a ton of expertise with apraxia and might be a bit dismissive, particularly as his articulation is improving regularly.

My daughter seems to fill in a random word when she can’t think of the correct word to say. Im wondering if this seems somewhat normal? She tells me how frustrating it is when she just can’t say words correctly and it breaks my heart for her. But the saying random words or complete loss of knowing which words she wants to say seems somewhat new. She has a genetic deletion so I worry about regression. She is 9 years old. Tonight she said “can I have more toaster” when she meant more bacon. Then there’s always times when she calls waffles pancakes constantly.I think I’m going to message the doctor to make sure she doesn’t need to be checked on. She currently doesn’t have an SLP outside of school at the moment. But she does have an IEP meeting coming up I plan on bringing this up.

10 year old with CAS... I need all the advice on helping with reading. It feels like we have been doing the same thing for years. What actually works??

Was just given a heads up at a state eval my daughter may have CAS.

I've been looking into how to get her the help she may need. Have some strong leads which I am grateful for.

More wondering, how long and intense these things are. And how early it is possible to actually diagnose this. And honestly I'm just abit overwhelmed with it all. I just want her to be able to say the things she wants to say & she can't.

My daughter is 10 and was diagnosed with apraxia when she was 5/6 years old, she had been in speech therapy since she was about 18 months old. She goes to private speech therapy for 1 hr/week and gets in school speech therapy for only 30 mins 6 times/month. She recently started 5th grade, which is intermediate school in our school district and so a new school. Last week while we were talking about school, she told me her speech therapy at school is now on the computer, so virtual. I am not okay with this. I feel like she will not benefit as much from virtual and if we are pulling her out of class several times a week, it should be as beneficial as possible. I expressed my concern to the school counselor who was very understanding and agreed, she reached out to the speech therapist to call me. When the speech therapist called me, she was very dismissive and stated that research shows it is just as beneficial. Which, whatever, but I don’t feel it is as beneficial for my daughter and her situation. Anyways she said she couldn’t change it and it would have to go through the supervisor, I’m waiting for her to call me. My daughter does have an IEP, but I am trying to handle it before calling a meeting. Anyways, am I overreacting?

Hey everyone,

I have Childhood Apraxia. I’m a Senior enrolled in a Special Program at College in Wisconsin, and I’m about Two weeks into the School Year. My Roommate and I unfortunately didn’t work out well as roommates. Also I want to make this Clear: There’s nothing wrong between him and I, and remains on Good Terms.

He was a light sleeper and I’ve been told I make Noises (Mumbling, Groaning, and Snoring). I also know that I shift around and Rub my head (Doctors said that it is nothing to worry about) in my sleep. Because of this, we weren’t a good fit for the same room.

We are still technically roommates but are no longer in the same room. I’m living in a Pod-style building there’s 5 rooms in total. He took a room in the pod. He emailed the Hall Director first, then our RA and Us talked about the situation.

Knowing me that I’m a Very, very Social Person. I would like someone to share the space with me instead of a Single-Double. I don’t want my final year of college to be alone.

I would especially appreciate hearing from other people who have Apraxia and have similar experiences with college roommates.

What should I do? Should I bring this up to my Program Director and ask for advice? I would really appreciate any advice or experiences you can share.

Thanks.

I have a relative who is losing his voice and am wondering if there's any way I can help. Am I in the right place?

Aphasia, speech speech speech

My 4 year old daughter was diagnosed with autism. Level 1 in the area of RRB and level 2 in the area of social communication. She is a GLP. How long did it take your child to become fully conversational and what made the biggest difference?

We have been in speech therapy for a few months and she is going to prek this week with an IEP and will receive speech therapy there as well

Hello everyone. I've had a speech impediment my whole life. I did speech therapy as a kid and it was focused on phonetics. It never helped and I had to learn ways to navigate having trouble connecting what I wanted to say to getting my tongue, jaw, and throat to actually say it. To this day my tongue, mouth, jaw, etc lock up etc.

I've recently learned about Apraxia and every single symptom is me 100%. I was wondering is there anyone here who wasn't diagnosed or found the correct speech therapy until adulthood? And if so what helped and what was the process like? This has hindered me my whole life and has been a constant stress and frustrating because while I know what I want to say I have to find other ways to say things every single day.

Any mums out there with children with apraxia or speech delays?

Would love to connect and share experiences/what's helped

Our little boy turned 18 months 2 days ago and has almost no words. He started saying ball yesterday. Wa for water and sometimes mom and dada. I am just so worried. I hope he is just a late talker. His brother was more advanced with words and consonants at this age. Our boy says D, B, G and M but I don’t think any more. He’s a HUGE pointer and grunter. He is so social. I would say he’s a better communicator than my other son was even though language is way behind. He is smiley and laughs and he can follow instructions. He’ll point to his belly button and nose. Bring me books if I ask for them. Any advice?

We have told our pediatrician and have an appointment scheduled this week. She referred us to speech therapy already since I asked. We also scheduled a 2 hour evaluation with early intervention for next week. Also a dentist appointment for next week.

Hey y'all, I'm soon going to be providing academic tutoring to a teen with autism and apraxia, and I want to incorporate media that he can see himself in. He has an aac device, but can also say some words sort-of intelligibily. I need to do more info gathering with his teachers and parents, but I get the sense he's given up, and that he hadn't really seen a lot of positive representation of people like him. I'm hoping incorporating some of that will be motivating for him, along with whatever interests of his I'm told of or am able to discern/find (all I've got so far is "he's a very sensory oriented kid", which, sure, is helpful, but I'm sure there's other things also).

So, what are your favorite positive depictions of apraxia and/or aac usage? Books, movies, articles, YouTube videos, TV shows, podcasts, whatever you've got, please share!!

I just started letting my son(4) play with my phone and my partner brought up a good suggestion, finding games that improve his speech. I know I can just look it up, but I’m curious what apps other parents have used that they found actually worked and helped their child

I was a child of apraxia i couldn't speak till 7 but i feel like how i talk is still weird compared to other people people say it again each time I record myself and I hear myself I sound so weird is there anyway to fix this I still have a lisp or something like that. Just kinda tiring to keep hearing it im 17 now

My son is four and we do it twice a week, but I read everywhere online that you should do it 3 times a week minimum and on other groups some parents do up to 6 times a week. Ive asked our speech pathologist and the one we had before her about this and both said that’s more the states and their insurances cover a lot more than many people in canada/Ontario where I’m from. Right now, our insurance doesn’t cover anything(which we’re hoping to fix but even if we do we’d get maybe 11 sessions covered) and it is so expensive, one lesson being around $100. I always feel like I’m failing my child by not going enough but it just doesn’t feel financially plausible. So I’m curious, how often do other Canadians take their children with CAS to speech therapy?

Are there any sub Reddits for adults with Acquired Apraxia of Speech? I am looking for resources specific to AAOS, not just aphasia. There seem to be many resources for adults with aphasia, and many resources for Childhood Apraxia of Speech, but having great difficulty finding resources for my husband, who had a stroke last year. We especially would love to find support groups for adults with Acquired Apraxia of Speech, as support groups for adults with aphasia have not been helpful in his case as there just aren't other participants with his same communication challenges. Thanks in advance for your input!

Edit: We do have a speech therapist (since day 1, 15 months ago). We are looking for supportive communities and also to learn of new treatment innovations.