DD is just over 26 months, her speech is still quite limited. Most of her 'words' are more sounds; you can ask her any animal and she will respond with the sound (cat, dog, wolf, cow, chicken, duck, elephant, lion, tiger, crocodile, snake, frog to name a few), you can also ask her what sound does a car make or truck or the phone, door bell, water etc and she has no problem answering with the sounds. Her understanding is also very good; can ask her for a blue ball, red ball, yellow ball and she will get it, for a towel, bucket, the phone, pack up her toys, get undressed for bath, time to put on shoes, get an apple, pear, where is Imogen's eyes, nose, toes, hair, elbows... any body part or even where is Mummy's and she understands to point to my tummy or my ears, same for Grandma's tummy, ears etc or Poppa, Uncle etc. If you tell her something is hot she will do a hands off action and make a drawing air in noise, like oo oo hot. She also does shh shh (finger to lips) at appropriate times (sneaking up on someone for example) or if you ask her if she can hear something will put her hand to her ear and concentrate on listening. She can follow playschool songs and actions - wheels on the bus, dingly dangly scarecrow, heads and shoulders, build it up etc. She can shake her head for yes or no and does the "I don't know" shoulder scrunching business too. So pretty typical 2 year old in that regard, she obviously understands what most words mean so I'm not concerned about that, I don't think her comprehension is behind at all.

She doesn't talk much though, like at all. She can communicate but it is all non-verbal. If she asks for a breastfeed for example (pointing to breasts), I will say could Imogen ask for milk please or could Imogen try and say milk, she knows what milk is but she won't even attempt to say the word; same with anything else. If I give her an apple or pear, can we try and say pear or apple... hello, goodbye... bath, can we say bath. Always trying to encourage her to give it a go but so far; nothing. The only thing she will join in with is counting, if I count to 10 she will make sounds along with me that do sound on the right track, so it seems she can mimic (same with being able to replicate animals sounds etc the ability to copy seems to be there). She does babble occasionally, especially when playing. I don't really push it when she doesn't want to give a word a go, just always offer the oppurtunity because I figure she will get there in her own time... right?

But this is where I am torn. Most of me thinks she is alright, not keen to rush her and isn't concerned but there is a part of me that thinks, if there is a problem then the earlier the better to find out and get help for it, I don't want to hold her back. I've also heard there can be a bit of a wait for this sort of intervention. Does anybody have any advice or experience? If I did want to take steps towards 'something' where do you start? Do you just discuss your concerns with the GP?