Chicken Soup for the SLP Soul Bloghop!

Hey friends!

I’m so excited to be a part of this super cool blog hop! When I was younger (and had time to just sit and read), I read tons of the “Chicken Soup for the Soul” books. I loved how some stories were funny, some were sad, and all were inspirational. So when Felice (the Dabbling Speechie) suggested we do a Chicken Soup for the SLP Soul blog hop, I jumped at the chance!

Though I was super excited to write this post, I had a terribly difficult time deciding what to write about. I’m sure many (if not all of you) have had someone in your life tell you at some point that you should write a book after you tell them a story or two from your SLP life. I get that from my family all the time. Regularly I’ll write funny or inspirational stories down so I’ll remember them. I sometimes even look back at the funny ones when I’m having a bad day! So I sorted through tons of stories and finally chose what has to be my favorite one of all time:

Preacher Man

Before my current job, I worked at the best elementary school I could imagine. The school has self-contained Autism classrooms from PreK-5th grade. Though many of the students could be funny from time to time, one of the boys in the 2nd grade classroom kept us laughing daily. He is lovingly referred to as the “preacher man” because he is always saying things like “Praise Jesus” and “yes Lord!”

One day, I went to get him for therapy and his classroom teacher was having a hard time getting him to do any work. He kept pulling on his right ear and saying there was water in there. His classroom teacher told me that when he went to take a drink of water from the water fountain that morning, he turned his head and water shot in his ear. They wiped his ear out and when I looked, it was completely dry. I just figured he had gotten “stuck” on the topic and was perseverating on the water in his ear, so I told him to stand up and jump while shaking his head to the right.

If only I had known…

I was planning on saying something like “Great job! The water is all gone now, so we can get back to work.” But you guys, I kid you not. When that kid started jumping and shaking his head, water literally poured out of his ear. It was like a dam broke. There was actually a puddle of water on the table! The classroom teacher and I were shocked. But the look on the kid’s face was priceless. He looked even more surprised than we were. He grabbed his ear, ran around the room, and shouted “I can hear! I’ve been healed! Praise the Lord, I’m healed!” May we all have such strong childlike faith!

I hope you’re enjoying hopping through these stories as much as I am! You can head back to the first blog by clicking the picture below:

Or can head to the next blog by clicking the picture below:

And don’t forget to keep up with the numbers. There are awesome prizes at the end!