Living in Silence

One of the nicest things as a parent is chatting with your child, hearing all the exciting and crazy things that go on in their heads…

But what if your child can’t tell you about their day?

This is Dexter, my 4-year-old son.

Dexter doesn’t talk.

It’s not that he can’t, more that he just doesn’t want to.

Everyone says that they will talk when they are ready. That’s true. But what about when you are ready for them to talk to you, but they won’t?

Seeing my son, he seems happy and I have to believe that he is. But it can be truly heart-breaking. Seeing all his classmates coming out of nursery calling for their mums and dads, telling them about their day, what they had for snack or what they played with. But Dexter, he comes out silent. I get a big cuddle and he’ll stretch out his arms for me to pick him up. But when I start talking to him, asking him all the questions a mum wants to know:

“Did you have a nice day?”

“Who did you play with?”

“Are you happy?”

“Do you have any friends?”

All I can settle for is a smile and maybe a nod or the shake of a head.

We work very hard, he attends one on one speech therapy, has done for two years now and truly it has helped. But honestly, I want more. I want to be able to chat with him, hear his stories, his thoughts, his dreams.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m lucky, I have a kind, loving, gorgeous little boy and I wouldn’t change him for the world, he is who he is and that’s okay.

Hopefully one day, this will all be a distant memory. All we can do is carry on working together, and hope.