When people ask what I do for a living, unless they have already worked with a speech-language pathologist, they usually assume that I work only with children who have speech impairments.  To be fair, S-LPs do work with a lot of children who have difficulty producing a clear /r/ sound, or who have a lisp, or who make so many speech sound errors that only their mothers, or primary caregivers can understand them.  (And honestly, I have to say that it is incredibly gratifying to help a child, whose parents can barely understand a word he or she says, become completely intelligible).  But this really is just the tip of the iceberg of what our professional lives entail.

Speech-language pathologists can work with clients of all ages, with many different diagnosed (and undiagnosed) conditions or disorders, in all types of settings and on all kinds of helping teams.  We have the privilege of working with infants and toddlers, preschoolers, school-age children, adults and seniors. We also learn from helping clients that have learning disabilities, survived a stroke, or been born with multiple disorders or one of many syndromes.  We teach some clients strategies to help them compensate for difficulties with memory, reading comprehension, processing language, problem-solving, and stuttering, just to name a few.  We give workshops to teachers, educational assistants and parents of children with special needs, and present to college and university students. We provide speech and language services and work on teams in community health centres, schools, children’s and rehabilitative hospitals and client’s homes.  We do research to determine the effectiveness of assessment tools and therapy approaches and advocate for those that may benefit from our expertise.  We are a helping profession dedicated to serving our clients and their families with compassion, empathy and integrity.

So I am a speech therapist… at your service.