A LITTLE BIRD

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How Nana becomes
Naney becomes Nande
becomes Nancy.

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ELIZABETH APPLEBAUM ASSISTANT EDITOR

loves to read, paint and
host tea parties for her
stuffed animals. She's also
tackling yet another chal-
lenge: learning to speak.
Natalie has verbal dys-
praxia, a neurological dys-
function that affects her
ability to handle certain
motor tasks, such as
speech. The problem
occurs in vitro and is not a
brain disorder. Though
some with verbal dysprax-
ia are mentally disabled,
this is not true for Natalie.

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Nancy Kaufman with Natalie Jacobs: Speech is power.

THE D E TRO I T J E WISH NE WS

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atalie Jacobs is 3
1/2 years • old and
already a bril-
liant fighter.
She was born
prematurely at
26 weeks, a tiny
baby who, her
mother says,
"looked like a little bird."
She required months on
a respirator in the hospital
and later•in an oxygen
tent at home. She had
numerous ear infections.
She has angiomas, in
which blood vessels grow
uncontrollably, making

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1.C.

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and swollen.
But nothing stopped
her.
•"She's strong," says her
mother, Lori Jacobs. "She
has to be to go through
what she went through."
Today, Natalie's motor
skills development is • still
a little slow and her face
continues to show
angiomas (she will be old
enough for plastic surgery
next month). But she is a
bright and happy girl —
"carefree," her mother
says.
Natalie attends Temple

Several months ago,
Natalie had a two-word
comprehensible vocabu-
lary. "She could under-
stand everything," her
mother says. "Yet she
couldn't verbalize."
Then Natalie began
coming twice a week to
speech and language
pathologist Nancy Kauf-
man. She still has a ways
to go, but Natalie's speech
has improved dramatical-
ly.
A bouquet of pink rib-
bons in her hair, Natalie
sits working with Nancy
Kaufman on a Monday
afternoon.
The office is filled with
toys. The two sit on the
floor, playing with a
miniature Big Bird and
Cookie Monster and plas-

