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Infant and Early Child Development in my Life
Alicia M. Lymas
Richland Community College
The health and developmental problems of infancy through early childhood are frightening for
new parents or anyone raising a child to endure. It requires a knowledge of family heredity and
a combination of specialists to ensure these challenges can be overcome and not follow a child
into adulthood, whenever possible.
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The Infant and Early Childhood Development in my Life
Heredity and Specialists play an important role in our infancy through adult development
stages. Problems can be a great source of stress for expectant parents and anyone raising a child.
When a child is born with problems, both fear and anxiety occur. The infant’s parents may ask,
“Will this be a permanent condition?” or “Where can I get help?” These were the questions my
parents asked upon my birth and strove to find answers for. I faced many uphill battles from birth
through early childhood development but can honestly say that there are specialists that can help
and challenges in childhood development can be overcome.
When I was born, I had difficulty breathing. I was slightly blue at the bridge of my nose
and coughed a lot. The doctors and nurses assured my mother that all was fine and sent me home
three days later. Within one month, I suffered a choking episode and stopped breathing. I was
rushed to the hospital and sent home later with assurances it was probably an isolated incident
and to call the Pediatrician. The doctor instructed my mom to burp me more, elevate me in a
baby chair following feedings. When the incident reoccurred, he changed my formula to soy
milk. Coincidentally, both my older siblings were allergic to regular formula for their first year
of infancy. The doctor felt that an allergy to milk was hereditary. Still, the problems continued.
At two months old, I had a severe reaction to my first immunizations. On the drive home
I stopped breathing. I was rushed back to the hospital and admitted. Many tests were done, and I
was diagnosed with severe gastro-esophageal reflux. They sent me home with an apnea monitor
that I remained on for the next three months. Heredity again played a factor when, through
several conversations with various family members, my parents were told reflux was an inherited
condition as well as the asthma I was diagnosed with in my teens.
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Despite my health issues, I began to crawl at five months and walked between eight and
ten months, a relatively normal accomplishment. The pediatrician had told my parents that the
reflux would improve with mobility, yet it persisted. He next instructed that anything taken by
mouth was to be thickened with baby cereal. When the reflux refused to improve, the doctor
suggested surgery at twelve months. In my case, my stomach would fire a small amount of
undigested food up through my esophagus with such force it would occasionally block my
windpipe, stopping my breathing or causing me to gasp and choke. This was a potentially deadly
situation and the pediatrician felt surgery was the only option left. My parents were very worried
and scared. They were uncomfortable about the risks involved and my future quality of life. The
problem was resolved at twelve months when I drank pure 2% milk from my sister’s cup, and
nothing happened! My parents started mixing my formula with more and more milk until I was
drinking pure 2% milk. The reflux disappeared and followed shortly by replacement of the
pediatrician.
Seemingly normal, my first word spoken was “Da” but was probably the only intelligible
word I could speak. No adult seemed to understand any sounds or words I spoke. I became shy
around them and unwilling to talk. My sister seemed to be the only person I could translate my
needs to or bring me what I wanted. It was our own language! Yet other kids and adults laughed
or made fun of me and it led to me becoming socially distant and untrusting of others.
Between one year and eighteen months, I developed severe night terrors. A night terror is
akin to a nightmare you cannot wake up from. Although you are no longer asleep, you do not
recognize your surroundings or the people around you. These occurred nightly, sometimes
several times per night.
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The pediatrician ordered tests done, including hearing testing because of my speech
problem, at a Children’s hospital. After two months the night terrors ceased, as suddenly as they
began. My hearing tests were all normal.
My sister had been attending child development classes for speech and language delays
in our local public school for over a year when a public screening was offered for three-year old
children. I was only two and a half years old, but my mom talked with my sister’s teacher and
explained my problems and I was invited to the public screening. After going to three areas for
assessment, they brought me back to my mom and said they couldn’t understand me, and the
school would contact us. In less than a week the school called and set up a private screening.
After completion, my mom was informed that I had scored low in fine motor skills (negotiation
handling small objects in the correct manner), language, speech, emotional, social and cognitive
areas. They wanted me to start early childhood classes at the school and meet with their
education specialists within two weeks. I attended these classes for three years, until starting
Kindergarten.
I give a lot of credit to the teachers who helped me for those three years. Before starting
school, I had been teased, ridiculed and laughed at by both children and adults. I was unable to
communicate along normal channels and avoided socializing, remaining reserved and quiet.
Over my three years in Early Childhood Development classes at school, I formed friendships,
was encouraged to try again and began to experience different ways of thinking and imagining.
My communication, speech and language skills improved and the world opened up before me.
Fear was gone. I will always be indebted to all of their efforts.
I also give the medical specialists my gratitude in helping me through infancy and early
childhood. Receiving correct diagnoses and running the correct tests to administer the correct
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treatments to help me was crucial to my improved health and development. They were also able
to ask the right questions to discover inherited conditions that could aggravate successful
development.
As I began Kindergarten classes my sense of confidence had risen and I loved learning! I
continued with both speech and language aid through a Speech teacher separate from my regular
Kindergarten class. All of the other testing levels were now on a normal scale. My speech had
dramatically improved and I was able to communicate well with others and not fear
embarrassment or ridicule.
Heredity and various specialists during infancy and early childhood played important
roles in helping me conquer life threatening illnesses and severe developmental delays that have
failed to follow me into adulthood. As an adult, I have used many things I have learned about my
heredity and health issues into bringing up my own children. Two of my children have asthma
and one has severe reflux issues and is developmentally delayed. Becoming aware of my
inherited conditions has helped me seek health and educational specialists that can help my
children overcome their own obstacles which do not need to be debilitating, nor permanent
through their remaining stages in life. That is the reason why I believe heredity and specialists
play an important role in our infancy and child development stages.
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