Speech Therapy

On Monday, 1/23, we had a consultation with Nathan's speech therapist and another speech therapist.  Since Nathan has not made a lot of progress in the last six months THEY suggested that Sue, the other speech therapist, take over Nathan's therapy.  I have not been happy with Nathan's speech therapy thus far so I was all for the idea.  Sue's credentials are higher and so we will be paying more for her, but it would still be less than transferring his speech therapy to the hospital's program like his pediatrician suggested.  I also asked for weekly sessions to start.  We were supposed to be meeting 3x a month in the past, but we were lucky to get 1 or 2x which impaired Nathan's progress.  I think weekly sessions will help Nathan and it will help me to stay focused on his therapy.  I think it is going to be a lot more demanding on us, but I am hoping that it will pay off in the long run.  So Nathan's former speech therapist will still oversee his case, but she will no longer be doing his therapy

However, they share a lot of my concerns, concerns that I fear could indicate a bigger problem.  It is still early to tell, but these things do not seem normal:
1) He only says a few words and he does not say them correctly.  For example, he says dar for car and Nana for our dog Nina. 
2) He does not pronounce the ending of words.  So many of his B words (belt, balloon, bike) all sound like ball. 
3) He repeats sounds.  Mama, dada, wawa, Nana, dogdog, etc...
4) He says moo when sees a cow.  That is a good association, but he has never said cow and so far that is the only animal sound he has said.
5) He does not say simple common words like hi or bye. He has said yeah and no a couple of times, but that is all.
6)  He seems to get a little confused with his language.  Like when we are going downstairs he says up...but maybe because he knows how to say up and has yet to say down. 
7)  He has not picked up many signs.  He knows milk, all done and more.  More is actually not even done correctly since he made up his own version.  And, even though he used to say milk now he only does the sign for it.

On a lighter note, I talked to an old friend on the phone on Tuesday.  I don't even like to talk on the phone, but we talked for over an hour.  Conversation flowed freely and I felt like there was so much more we could talk about as well.  I hope we can keep in better touch because I miss her friendship...and I think she feels the same way about me.