every.word.counts

Today I'm excited to link up with Heavenly Homemakers for my very first Gratituesday! 

Join us for Gratituesday at Heavenly Homemakers!

Words. They are so easy to take for granted unless you are in a position where they don't come easily. Then, words hold much meaning.  


A LITTLE BACKGROUND:
As many Autie parents have experienced, we will use things that are highly desired to try and coax those precious words out of our kiddos. For instance, Boogie (my son) loves to eat. I mean, like it's a sport. He loves food. Mind you, only specific food, but food nonetheless. So we knew that using food would be a big motivator to get Boogie to speak. [If we tried with toys or other things, he would just give up and go do something else.]


It worked. He learned that if he  made utterances out of his mouth that sounded like the utterances we made, it would result in his desired food. He liked it. He slowly made the connection that the utterances would work for other things as well. We were on our way to being able to communicate with each other!


Herein lies the problem. When you teach a child to speak based on what they want and/or need, then words become used only to serve a function. And that's exactly what happened. Boogie spoke to receive. We went through the typical echolalia phase. That was to be expected and as a Mama, I knew when he was comprehending a word or just merely repeating it. What I didn't expect was that he only spoke to get what he wanted or to please us. He wouldn't initiate.


Over this past year, Boogie has started initiating conversations. And not always just to get something so it's been a joy to watch. And when he speaks to show love...that is a gift from God. It happened today. I'm working from home and I just don't feel well. I'm achy and I have a headache that is so painful, I had trouble sleeping. I'm constantly having to take breaks from the computer as the screen is bothering me. Just all around kind of blah. Well, Boogie came home from school, saw me, smiled and ran over to give me a hug (a new thing, he's only been doing that for the past two months but I'll take it!!). On his way over, Hubby saw me wincing in pain. 


Hubby: "How ya doin' over there?"
Me: "Not so good, my head is killing me"
Boogie (in midst of my hug): "Aww, Mommy, I want you feel better. I lah you." <patting my back>


Wow. God is good! Boogie didn't have to use his words to give me love, it gave him nothing in return...but he chose to do so anyway. I love that little guy. And I love how God uses him to show me pure love. 


So today... I am grateful for words.


~~Joy

Copyright (c) 2012 Joy-Jasmin Brunnelson
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