My SLP Story

Looking back I there’s no doubt I was meant to be a Speech Language Pathologist.

It just took me a little while to realize it.

As a child, when my younger brother had difficulty communicating due to recurring ear infections, I’m told I was the only one who could understand him, often serving as his translator (“He wants a tissue!”)

But when I had the opportunity to observe the speech therapist at my mother’s school I was less than enthralled. Little did I know just how much more to our field there was than articulation drills.

So for a while I entertained I the idea of being a nurse. But when I got to college and saw the amount of calculus involved (yikes!) I promptly switched my major to psychology and upon graduation happily stumbled into the growing field of behavior therapy. 

Working with young children recently diagnosed with autism fascinated me.  I spent the next three years doing in-home Applied Behavior Analysis including serving as a shadow aide in classrooms, facilitating play dates, training families, and collaborating with other professionals, including SLPs.

And man, the SLP’s had hands down the best gig.

Watching a child’s frustration fade as he finally got his message across, witnessing the joy of her family as she spoke a new word – it was thrilling!

I mean seriously what could be cooler than helping a child communicate?

I applied and was fortunate to accepted to a program in my home of San Francisco. Although at the time the 3 and ½  years of grad school seemed daunting, it went by in a flash and I’ve never looked back. To this day I’m still thrilled with each new skill acquired, no matter how small, enjoy collaborating with parents, teachers, and other professionals and love that our field gives us the opportunity to never stop learning. Transitioning from early intervention to working with school-age and middle school students last year was a huge learning curve but as SLP’s we thrive on those challenges, don’t we?

So that’s pretty much why I became an SLP. Well that and the hugs. You can’t beat the hugs;)

Thanks to Kristen Immicke of Talkin with Twang and The Frenzied SLP's for letting me link up! Looking forward to checking out more SLP stories!