So while our younger son was busy watching his favorite shows, my older son went to my left side, touched my arm, looked at me in the eyes, and then flashed a big smile. I knew right at that instant what it was that he wanted: he was borrowing my phone.

I don’t know how to describe how I felt at that time except that I was overflowing with happiness when my son made an effort to communicate with me. It was a wordless communication but it was deep, his eyes were full of meaning so that I understood right away what he was trying to tell me.

I felt that we, his parents, had already made a deep connection with him to the point that we didn’t need words anymore to understand him. A simple gaze, the movement of his hand, and his body language are enough to tell us what he needs.

When he smiles, we know that he is happy and contented. When he cries, it’s mostly because we couldn’t understand what he was trying to tell us. Just the same, we still pray that he’ll be able to talk soon. But as I always say, a day at a time.

I’m sure other special needs parents have had similar experiences especially if they have a non-verbal child. There are magical moments like that that will catch us by surprise. It was also reassuring to know that our special needs children will always find a way to communicate with us in some form other than words or speech.

One of our biggest concerns, when we found out that our son has GDD, is that we were afraid that he might not be able to tell us what he was feeling, such as if he was sick or feeling pain. As the days passed, we soon realized that there are other forms of communicating such as through gestures. But again, we’d be the happiest people in the world if he uttered his first word. Until then, we’d share the love with each other through wordless communication.

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