[blindkid] New Family

Carly B barnesraiser at gmail.com
Mon Jun 27 14:44:45 UTC 2011


Hi Heather, and welcome to the list!

Our son was born in China and we adopted him when he was 5. (He joined two
brothers who were born to us.)  His language acquisition was as rapid as
everyone predicted. That is to say, within just 2 to 3 months he could make
himself understood with a few words ("Go McDonald's!" was pretty clear! :)
and within a year was speaking in complete and understandable sentences.
He's been with us for 3 years now and his language is still somewhat delayed
from a child his age born in the U.S. but he is what I would describe as
completely fluent.

I would say that the blindness, in my experience, had no effect on language
acquisition. In fact, it may be the opposite. Our son was quite verbal from
the start and "tuned in" to sounds of all kinds, including voices,
inflection, and language.

I hope this helps, and again, welcome!

:) Carolynn Barnes

On Mon, Jun 27, 2011 at 9:28 AM, Heather Breems <heatherbreems at gmail.com>wrote:

> Thank you Richard and Sally,
>
> We live in Chicago, Illinois.
>
> I am glad to hear that there are other adoptive parents as well.  My
> biggest
> concern initially is that we will speak a different language.  I am an
> adoption social worker and see children all the time who learn English
> within a few months of being here, but I am not sure if it will be
> different
> for a child who is blind.
>
>
>
> On Mon, Jun 27, 2011 at 9:19 AM, Richard Holloway <rholloway at gopbc.org
> >wrote:
>
> > Welcome Heather, there is a lot of great information here and there are
> > many people who are glad to help you however they are able.
> >
> > Sounds like you are here in the states; what part of the country are you
> > from?
> >
> > Richard
> > On Jun 27, 2011, at 10:11 AM, Heather Breems wrote:
> >
> > > Hello Everyone,
> > >
> > > I am new to this list and just wanted to briefly introduce myself and
> my
> > > family.  My husband and I are in the final stages of adopting a 2 and
> > half
> > > year old from Haiti who is assumed to have been blind since birth.  As
> > you
> > > can imagine the medical information from Haiti is scarce, but we have
> > > visited with him many times over the course of this year long adoption
> > > process and are so happy we will finally have him home soon.  I have
> > tried
> > > to do as much research and reading as possible to prepare ourselves
> first
> > > for helping him with the transition.  I am very encouraged to have
> found
> > > this group along with all the other resources that I know will help our
> > > family and our son.
> > >
> > > Sincerely,
> > >
> > > --
> > > Heather Breems
> > > _______________________________________________
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> >
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> >
> >
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>
>
>
> --
> Heather Breems
> _______________________________________________
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