Do You Expect Me to Talk?

I’m nearing panic mode with Abbie and her lack of communication. All the parenting resources say she should have been talking by 12 months. She still doesn’t talk except for a “mo” sound we interpret as “more” that she says only while we feed her, and in recent days she’s even stopped saying that. She doesn’t babble much, saying only a handful of sounds when she does babble (ay, uh, buh, ma, and mo). She doesn’t even point. To be fair, Ellie claims she points, I say she just grabs at things she wants. She communicates less than Brittney Spears does about her new baby.

We decided it was time to consult our pediatrician about her speech. Fortunately Ellie works with our pediatrician and can ask him questions every day. This is only fortunate for us; for him it’s the equivalent of spending every day at a Mormon dinner party with a giant “pediatrician” sign around his neck. Everyone can ask him piddling little questions about their children and hear daily updates. “Should I be worried that my child has had a cold for a week?” “What do I do when my child cries?” “My child’s nose is still stuffed after 10 days. Now what do I do?”

Not that our question is piddling or little. Our question involves communication, the very backbone of Abbie’s development. She’s already several words behind her peers; without some serious catching up, she’s on pace to spend her post-high school years living at home, sponging off her parents, and doomed to a life of unfulfilling career choices. Worse yet, she might even spend that time attending Florida State.

I shuddered thinking of all the things the pediatrician could recommend. Maybe she has hearing problems that require surgery at great expense and stress to our family. Maybe she has a learning problem that will hinder her mental development throughout her life. Maybe she doesn’t hear enough language throughout the day and I’ll have to read to her even more than I already do, a move that would seriously cut into my shower time.

What was our pediatrician’s advice? Stop coddling her. He explained to Ellie that, far from being mentally deficient, Abbie is actually a lazy super-genius, kind of like a 35-year-old electronics store clerk who’s figured out how to wire a 15x10 bedroom with a 2500-watt surround sound system, but hasn’t yet figured out how to move out of his parents’ basement. It seems that she’s smart enough to figure out that we will usually give her what she wants if she whines. Therefore she has no incentive to put forth the effort to learn a word when whining works just as well. If I don’t stop this behavior now, it will continue to worsen until one day when I find myself writing paper for her at Yale Law School.

I have no idea if our pediatrician always blows this much smoke or if we’re special because Ellie works with him. Either way, the part about her not talking because she doesn’t see the need to do so makes sense. Why learn to say “book” when daddy will read anything thrown at him? Better yet, why say anything when you’re bored when you can just whine and daddy will find something entertaining to do for you?

I no longer accept whining as a form of communication. At mealtime I require her to say for “more” before I give her another spoonful. I also accept her grabbing the spoon and bringing it to her mouth as a form of communication. No doubt this will lead to some meltdowns of epic proportions, but so far she has acquiesced to the power of the spoken word with minimal crying.

Whining while bored is a less successful. Sometimes she decides reading would be tolerable and holds a book out for me to read. I started asking if she wants to read this book, and she started saying “book,” a move that’s as refreshing as a 60-degree day to cap one of the hottest September’s I can remember. She actually says “buh,” but that’s close enough. Sometimes she refuses to say “book,” and I stare and ask what she wants. This situation often degenerates into whining, which often degenerates into biting, which her way of communicating “I just threw a book in your lap, what do you think I want? Jackass.”

Biting lands her in her crib. I wait out the screaming until I hear her calm down. At that point I walk up to her crib and ask what she wants, and she always raises her hand to signal “up.” When trapped in a crib, she has no time to wait for me to guess what she wants. I can only hope her future Yale professors also employ such strict time constraints.