What My Speech Delayed Daughter Taught Me About Love

My daughter Frankie doesn’t say my name.

She knows it. I’ve heard her whisper it at night, curled up in her toddler bed, when the house is quiet and the shadows stretch across the floor.

“Mommy,” she breathes, and for a second I believe I’ve dreamed it.

At night, behind her door, she practices. Soft words slip out like secrets, as if she’s testing them before anyone can hear. Pressure shuts her down. But in the dark, when no one is watching, her voice feels safe.

In the daylight, I try. I kneel. I call to her. She turns to me, eyes bright, smile full, but I can tell she doesn’t understand what I’m saying. She opens her mouth like she’s going to answer, but instead I hear bits of “Old McDonald” or sounds that don’t quite form words.

We started noticing something was off when she was almost 2. Frankie barely made any effort to talk. No words. No babble. Nothing you expect to hear at that age. She could make sounds, but it was like she didn’t see the point. It was as if speech belonged to a world she wasn’t interested in joining.

At her yearly checkup, her pediatrician confirmed what I had already started to fear: Frankie was speech delayed.

We’re not exactly sure what being speech delayed means, at least not in the way the specialists use it. Officially, it refers to a delay in a child’s ability to use or understand spoken language compared to what’s typical for their age. But in real life, it’s less about definitions and more about all the things that don’t happen. The words that don’t come. The instructions that don’t land. The way she doesn’t turn when someone says her name.

We’ve had to figure it out piece by piece, watching, guessing, and trying again. No one hands you a manual. You just start where you are.

Since then, we’ve seen several speech therapists. They all say the same thing. Frankie is delayed in both expressive and receptive language. She struggles to understand what’s said to her and can’t find the words to respond. It’s like a wire in her brain isn’t connecting, or the signal cuts out before it reaches her mouth.

She’s 4 now, but her speech still trails behind. The words come out slowly, like they’re caught in traffic — delayed but determined to arrive.

She knows around 100 words like “ball,” “up,” and “car.” “No,” always with a grin and a wag of her finger. Every so often she’ll say two words in a row, like “more juice” or “go outside,” usually while tugging at my sleeve or pointing. But the words come out in fragments, half-formed, and they fade before I can respond. Like trying to catch soap bubbles.

Her thoughts move faster than her mouth can follow. I see it in her eyes, in the way she watches her sister, solves puzzles quickly, and remembers songs after hearing them once. Her thoughts are whole. Her mouth just can’t keep up.

Wordless melodies rise from her room like steam. She sings what she cannot say. She sings in the car, while twisting Play-oh into snakes, and in the bath as she lines up toy ducks in a parade. Her songs shift with her mood. Bright and quick when she’s happy, slow and low when she’s unsure. They come from deep in her chest, like she’s trying to soothe the world into understanding.

She speaks in glances, in gestures, in the rhythm of her days. In the way she rests her cheek on my leg when she wants closeness. In the long, rising song she lets out before bedtime, signaling she’s ready for sleep. I’ve learned to read her language. The tilt of her chin. The tone of her singing when the day overwhelms her. I’ve become fluent in the space between her sounds.

Every day feels like a puzzle. Not just the kind with missing pieces spread across the rug, but the kind buried deep inside her. I spend my time studying the clues.

What made her cry just now?

What brought that sudden smile?

What is she trying to say with the shift of her shoulders, the flicker in her eyes, and the sound that rises in her throat but never forms a word?

And then there are moments that feel like answers. Not in words, but in joy. In motion. In the way her body speaks when language can’t.

Frankie loves to jump on the couch. Not bounce — launch. She throws herself into the air like a rocket, her curls flying, her arms wide. The cushions sink. The frame groans. And she laughs with loud, unfiltered joy that shakes the windows. I love watching her in those moments. Wild. Weightless.

When I tell her to stop, to be careful, she laughs. She doesn’t grasp the meaning behind my words. “If you fall, you’ll get hurt” means nothing to her. What she hears is the rhythm of my voice, not the warning in it.

I lift her down, my hands under her arms, her legs still kicking like she’s mid-flight. The moment her feet touch the floor, her body stiffens. She doesn’t scream. She leans away, confused. A whine builds behind her teeth. She wants to tell me something, but the words won’t come.

I try to imagine how it feels to be stopped by the person you trust most, without knowing why. One second she’s flying, full of joy. The next, I take that joy away with no warning and no explanation she can understand. To her, it must feel like the sky turning too fast, sun to storm without a sign.

So I kneel in front of her, eye to eye. I let my body speak. I throw my arms out, pretend to fall, and tap my head with a big, cartoonish “Oww!” She watches me closely, blinking, trying to piece together the story I’m telling without words.

Then, without a sound, she climbs right back onto the couch.

This is what parenting her looks like. Telling stories with my hands. Not rules, but rhythms. A daily dance of gestures, repetition and quiet hope. And on the days when nothing lands, when I’ve explained it a hundred different ways and she still climbs back up, all I can do is step back, stay close, and open my arms.

Ready to catch her. Always ready to catch her.

People say, “She’ll talk when she’s ready,” like that’s supposed to be comforting. It’s not. Not when I’ve spent nights Googling speech delays and developmental milestones. Not when I watch her on the playground, circling the other kids like a moon, unsure how to enter their orbit. Not when strangers glance at her, then at me, and ask carefully worded questions about her behavior. Not when I lie awake wondering if I missed something.

Was it the fever at nine months? The screen time I allowed because I was too tired to do anything else?

But there is no villain. No single moment. Just this path we walk together, but not always in sync.

Maybe she has autism. Maybe she doesn’t. We’re still figuring it out. I’ve filled out the forms, circled “sometimes,” “often,” and “never.” We’re on a waiting list for testing. Some days I want a name, something concrete to hold. Other days I’m scared of it. But no diagnosis will change how I mother her. It won’t make her easier to understand or harder to love.

It might give us tools. It might help others understand. But it won’t unlock her world like a key. I still have to meet her exactly where she is.

At her last dental appointment, we sat in a brightly lit room filled with chatter, toys, and the steady buzz of overhead lights. Frankie clung to me, singing low and steady, the sound she makes when she’s trying to stay calm. When the hygienist called her name, we stood up and walked back together.

Then the dentist reclined her chair.

Her body stiffened. She whimpered. Then came the moan — not loud, but raw. It was the sound of fear rising fast. Not from pain, but memory.

She doesn’t understand what the dentist is doing. She doesn’t know what “open wide” means. What she does understand is restraint. Cold hands. Bright lights. The sharp sting of a needle. She remembers being pinned down at past appointments, not knowing why she couldn’t move, only that it felt wrong and scary. Her body knows more than her words ever could.

The dentist glanced at me, then across the room, and said, “She moans like she has autism.”

The words landed hard. Not because I’m afraid of what they meant, but because of how he said them. Flat. Loud. No pause. No awareness of who was listening.

Frankie didn’t understand what he said, but she felt it. She heard the sharpness in his voice, the way it cut through the room. Her shoulders tensed. She kept moaning, the sound turning into soft, steady cries.

I pulled her into my lap and rested my hand on her back. I drew slow circles with my thumb, the motion that tells her I’m here, that she’s safe. Her body leaned into mine. She pressed back — giving her answer.

That’s what people don’t see. She might not understand the words, but she senses everything: the shift in a voice, the rise in volume, the change in energy. She takes it all in and gives her response the only way she knows how, just not in the way the world expects.

I believe — no, I know — that one day, the words will come. Whether in a rush or a trickle, I will be there. I’m one of the lucky ones, because I still get to hope. I hold that hope like a fragile flame.

But hope doesn’t erase the ache.

Some days, the ache is unbearable. I speak and hear no reply. I offer a hug, and she turns away. I say, “I love you,” and get no response. It feels like shouting into a canyon, my voice swallowed before it can reach the other side. Some days, I lie awake wondering if she knows I’m her mother or just the person who opens applesauce and ties her shoes.

And then I hate myself for wondering. Because I love her with everything in me, even when I can’t feel her reaching back.

And then she surprises me.

One evening, after a summer rain, we sat together on the front porch. The sidewalk was still wet, the air soft and quiet. A tiny green frog appeared on the step. Frankie spotted it and crouched low. Inches from its face. Her fingers stayed still. Her voice softened.

Not loudly. Just a gentle, curious tune. A song only she could have written. The frog didn’t move. They sat like that for almost a minute, staring at each other. Then Frankie smiled. A small, sure smile that stayed with me the rest of the night.

That’s when I stopped needing proof of connection. That moment was enough.

Still, I would be lying if I said it didn’t hurt. This not knowing. This reaching and missing.

Most days, all I want is to hear her call me Mommy.

Some nights, after her sister is asleep and the house quiets, Frankie climbs into my bed with her tablet. She doesn’t ask. She just knows. She curls into the pillows like she belongs there, limbs warm and tangled with mine. I lie beside her. Sometimes I watch her screen. Sometimes I just watch her.

She sings a tune she’s made up. It sounds like a lullaby someone left behind in the wind.

I whisper, “I love you.”

She doesn’t say it back. She never has. But she turns to me. Her eyes meet mine. Soft. Steady. She reaches out and touches my cheek. Not with hesitation. With certainty. And I understand. Love doesn’t always speak.

Sometimes it sings in the dark.

Sometimes it jumps without fear.

Sometimes it cries out and needs to be held.

Sometimes it crouches low to serenade a frog.

Sometimes it curls beside you, glowing in the soft blue of a screen, and finds your face.

Not with words, but with everything that matters.

Bethany Bruno is a Floridian author and amateur historian. Born in Hollywood and raised in Port St. Lucie, she holds a B.A. in English from Flagler College and an M.A. from the University of North Florida. Her work has appeared in more than 90 literary journals and magazines, including The Sun, McSweeney’s Internet Tendency, River Teeth’s Beautiful Things, and HuffPost. She’s seeking representation. Visit www.bethanybrunowriter.com for more.

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