The Day of Firsts

I started my very first semester in clinic in Fall of 2004. I was a senior in my four-year undergrad program. Didn't actually feel much excitement or anything until the minute before I was suppose to go greet my client and lead them into the therapy room to get started. I was jumping up and down to get rid of the jitters and my clinical partner, I feel so bad for my clinical partner, MJ, she musta feel like I was the worst mistake to be paired up with. My clinical supervisor, Heather, was actually a student that had graduated from my school, gone on to her grad program and then returned (I don't know if there's more in between her movements) to her alma mater to become one of the clinical supervisors. Heather was very sweet, she directs by 'let's see how we can do this together' and always has that bit of 'you cna do it!' to give to you. She really made herself available to us...if I recall correctly, we met in the early AM each week to discuss about our weekly plans. One moment is especially stands out is halfway during the semester, I was just at the end of my rope...she took me aside into an unused therapy room, and ask what was wrong, and we talked. I find it hard to explain myself/be politically correct, so her attempt to figure that out was unexpected and touching.


"My child"
That's what we called (at least I did) our child clients for the two semesters we had them for phonological and language disorder classes. I had my first child assignment (it wasn't really clinic, more speech facilitation/play as we weren't supervised live time) in my sophomore year. It was junior/senior level class, but it just didn't work out that way for my schedule. So it was great opportunity for me to be in a seminar-like, hands-on class with students who had gone through a lot more classes than I had and to learn how they think, process stuff. I loved it! I had an almost 2 year old girl, diagnose was still being determined. Part of my job was to report what I did (obviously) and saw to help in this process. That was the sad part, because towards the end of the semester, it was pretty clear what it was (high functioning autism) and I wasn't allowed to say anything to the parent (and I didn't want to) and it was hard watching the mum talk about the uncertainty of it all. My child was very smiley and easy-going, and her mum caught on to techniques very quickly. It was good. I gave her a ball with my school colors on it as a gift, she had loved them that semester and we played with them a lot.
My second one was an almost 2 year old boy...he was a charmer! I had him my junior year, and his case ended 'more' happily ever after. When I met him, he was only one or less months behind in communication development. He loved noisy, manipulatable toys...had to keep up with his busy movements! It was tough getting him to speak while he concentrated hard on pushing the button to make a toy beep or make music, he gave me the impression of "I'll speak when I want to ok, and that's that!" Auditory bombardment seemed to work though, he said little but when he did, it was good. He progressed quickly over the course of the semester in terms of his speech, but after that semester ended I thought of something I didn't before...he had frequent colds, this might have affected his development. He did slow down towards the end of the semester, he was having a lot of colds then. He'd probably catch up soon though, he had a good enough base. His mum was very worried at the beginning but she looked less stressed out towards the end, I think he had shown enough progress to relieve her. She was a lot more quieter than the mother of my first child experience, but very cooperative and helpful, actaully, her mothering style is one I'd like to emulate. I was fortunate to work with him.