Parental Secrets Revealed
As far as I can tell, if anyone ever tells you “My baby’s first word was X,” they are total LIARS. Our experience has been that babies develop language far too gradually for them to really have 1 First Word.
Since he was about 6 months, Raimi has been using the “muh-muh-muh” sound whenever he’s sad or wants his mom. And “dah-dah” (or “dah-doo”, his current favorite word) has always been used in reference to something he likes or thinks is fun. (That’s me!) A lot of the time he’ll say “muh-muh-muh-muh” on and on like that, but sometimes he’ll just say “muh-muh” or “dah-dah.” So are those supposed to be his first words?
Further complicating this issue for us is that it doesn’t do anything on cue, and when he does do something, he’ll only do it once. Implorations for a repeat are ignored. Some of the words we are fairly certain we’ve heard him say at least once, but haven’t really been repeated:
No (said once, shouted, when we were trying to take something away from him)
Yeah
Bath
Cat
Doggy
Hello
(I was just waking up for that last one, so it’s possible I was still dreaming.)
So it’s possible that anyone of those words was his first word, but he doesn’t repeat anything often enough for us to figure out if he really associates those words with meaning yet.
Well, he sort of does. He will say “no-no-no” if he really doesn’t like something, but I wonder how innate a lot of this is. I mean there must be a reason why the negative begins with the N sound in so many languages, and the same for the M sound of mother.
Personally, I think he’s learning words like crazy, and choosing not to say them, because he enjoys my exasperated attempts to coax them out of him.
“Raimi, cat! Cat, Raimi, cat! CAT! CAT CAT CAT! What are you doing? Get that out of your mouth.”