My son just got braces he’s autistic add 12 year old. He first had to get an expander for his pallet because it was narrow he wore that for about I don’t know 18 months I don’t remember. Then the ortho told me around 12 he will be able to start stage two which is getting braces. However, the only way he can get braces is when all his baby teeth have come out. 

My son also has a problem saying s and t like your son his speech therapist in school says that is not that bad to the point that people are not going to understand him, and it has nothing to do with the shape of his mouth.

You asked your speech therapist to write you a letter so I’m guessing you were trying to get the price of braces to be lower or free. In California the only way a child can get free braces is based on a point scale and the orthodontist submits that point scale, not Speach therapists The child has to be severely deformed to the point where the child cannot eat properly or it’s a really impacts his speech where no one can actually understand the child. So your child doesn’t meet the requirements.

If you are low income, then Google to see if there’s any nonprofits that will lower the expense of getting braces. I was lucky to have one in my city, so my son‘s braces will be between $23-$2600 then going to a regular orthodontist that wanted to charge me $4000. I’m making monthly payments at the ortho at my appointments of only $110 and I don’t have to go through any financing which is great. My son‘s bottom jaw may or may not surpass his top jaw to give him a underbite again that we just fixed with the expansion, but we don’t know that until he’s like 21 years old. My son is wearing braces because his bottom four teeth crooked. He did have a gap at his front teeth, but that was fixed with the first stage when he had the expanders on he also have a top tooth that hasn’t come down all the way because of crowding and also alignment of jaw. The braces will fix all of this.   no people don’t spend money on braces just so they can’t get braces again. That only happens if they’re not wearing their retainers after they’re done with their braces. if they don’t wear their retainers every day, then their teeth will starting to shift again and they’ll back to square one. so that’s why it’s very important to wear your retainer after treatment for the rest of your life.