Back when we didn’t know that Miguel was developmentally delayed, I thought that he just didn’t like to focus on the things that I taught him. He wouldn’t listen to me when I read him stories. He didn’t respond when I was showing him photos of animals, the alphabet, and numbers. Miguel would just do the things that he wanted.

On my part, since I was losing my patience because I felt that all my efforts were futile, I turned to one solution that was sure to catch his attention and that was a tablet. Since I didn’t have many playmates when I was young, I grew up watching TV and learned from it. so I had a notion that tablets were also beneficial. Yes, I thought that it can do good instead of doing harm. And because of that idea, I didn’t read much about parenting and gadgets when I was a new dad.

Going back to Miguel, the tablet naturally worked for him although we limited the videos to bedtime stories and educational shows. Still, Miguel was just 10 months old at that time. Looking back, I wish I were more patient enough to observe him and probe deeper for reasons why he might have been inattentive at times. I might have been able to make better decisions that time if I asked, say, the pediatrician. I could’ve also just continued to read stories to him even if he seemed uninterested.

When we were doing home therapy, it was even more challenging for us. I do admit that teaching is not one of my best skills. And while we do try our best to implement the activities, our patience was tested with Miguel’s escape behavior. I found it to be physically exhausting at times – from setting up our activities to the actual implementation of the movement exercises, including convincing Miguel to cooperate.

There were times when our efforts seemed futile and we didn’t want to force Miguel because he was crying non-stop. So we ended up cutting short his activities. I know that it wasn’t really the best way to handle it but we just wanted to strike a balance between implementing the program and not putting pressure on our son.

Again, it was really a test of patience but just as our children’s pediatrician said, just do your best to continue what you are doing because we really can’t tell what positive effect it might have on our child.

As a matter of fact, this principle also holds true for neurotypical kids. Read a book to them, tell them stories, count from one to five, help them identify colors, and so forth. It need not be complex information; they’re small kids anyway. Bits and pieces of knowledge shared to them regularly will go a long way. You’d be amazed by the amount of information that they can retain.

Honestly, I’ve had some regrets. I wished I pushed myself to the limit and exerted more effort. But we can’t do anything about the past so what we’re currently doing is we’re trying to catch up.

I’m happy that Miguel has made a lot of progress since our home program last year. He’s more cooperative when it comes to his table top activities so we’re doing some adjustments to level up his lessons. I know we’ll get to our goal someday. In the meantime, we’re just enjoying our journey as a special needs family as well as the experiences along the way.

Again, arm yourself with loads of patience.

Similar stories: