Daughter refusing to speak normally

Yeah my daughter does stupid shite like this as well. I just ignore, ignore, ignore.

I find it mad that she’s happy even when I react negatively to it - but I suppose even bad attention is still attention isn’t it 🤷‍♀️

Exactly - and why do kids wind their parents up? To test if their love really is unconditional or will they be rejected. You can accept an expression of feeling and still hold boundaries on behaviour. Acceptance isn’t the same as encouragement. Ignoring her is rejection, that will prove the child’s test that love is conditional and can be withdrawn and will lay the foundations for a lifetime of issues.

Ignore it. Parent her as right fir her age. You do your part. She has to do hers. If not she will later regret not building boundaries and staying a girl in a woman's body

Yeah, this and the 'eff' off to someone who suggested a whole heap of compassion and fun with it, really struck me. Maybe she knows things are difficult and wants reassurance. I can't fathom why a silly voice could ruin a day out. She's little. Yr 4 isn't grown up. Let her be silly and stop hiding from her because of something completely trivial.

I'm not sure the op's going to come back. If you do op then I am picking up a huge amount of rage and upset in your posts. I don't think you are in a good place and you have no bandwidth at all to deal with your child who is probably seeking reassurance and attention. Can your husband take her out for the day tomorrow? Can you offload her on grandparents? You need to recharge your batteries enough so you can deal with your daughter with as much kindness as you can muster. Do you have a counsellor you could talk to? I hope you find a solution. I was taught praise good behaviour, ignore bad behaviour. Praise your daughter when she talks normally and ignore the baby talk.

I’d let her go back to school with this silly behaviour and let her teacher sort it out. She’ll soon realise she’s being ridiculous when she’s pulled up about it by someone other than her parents

OP, I am still confused as to why your DD who you say has no other issues or concerning behaviours whatsoever has been assessed by three different Psychiatrists and a Psychologist.

There is absolutely no way that NHS Child and Adolescent Mental Health services would accept a referral purely because a child was using baby-talk, it just simply wouldn't happen. Even if by some miracle the referral somehow managed to slip through the net, it wouldn't be passed to Psychiatry unless there were serious concerns about her risk or it was felt she needed medication. Most children who are open to CAMHS never see a Psychiatrist. A PP supposed they could have been private practitioners, which I guess is true but I can't for the life of me fathom why anyone would engage three different private Child Psychiatrists, at great expense, for a bit of baby-talk. I mean, what is a third going to tell you that the first two didn't?

It just doesn't make sense.

I agree with this. If she is losing friends, maybe try and sit her down and see if there is something else going on in her life that is worrying her.

My child has been trained to be a robot by this six-week break. We can't afford clubs - we've had friends around as much as we could, but not enough. I'm behind with my paid work, so DC has been chained to screens.

I feel very guilty and also very trapped by our circumstances. I didn't bank on our mortgage going up so much, or salaries flat-lining.

The idea that the DC have a lovely creative time while we are too selfish to have them around is so far from the truth. My DC benefits from routine and it is very hard to keep to it while they are at home every day.

I take comfort in them being kept safe, warm, and fed, but it's no childhood. Roll on September!

Hi OP,

When DD was 7, she suddenly developed a lisp, it must have lasted for a few months. It is still a mystery of why it happened! I have a feeling she copied it from somewhere...

Such a helpful comment. Really helping OP feel better, provides great insight.

Nothing wrong with saying broken home. OP clearly means there hasn't been some spectacular breakdown in her and her partners relationship and household that could have induced this behaviour.

My niece was doing this for a bit, it was just kind of a trend at her school, When the other kids stopped so did she. Could it just be an annoying fad?

"Nothing is wrong with her". How do you know, you live in her head? I'm not saying that she's ND or anything just that speaking baby language is something children do sometimes to comfort themselves and to seek comfort. The goal is not to indulge her so she goes on, but to indulge her so she stops! If you treat her like a baby : no screens, no big girl toys etc she will get sick of it and decide that it's a good thing being 8 and not 2. I did this with DS and it works. When he is stressed now he does his baby thing and I tell him come here little baby. Lasts 2 minutes and then he snaps back being the big boy he is (11). There is a pressure on children growing up too fast. Everyone tells me my DS is so mature and wellbehaved etc but he needs to be able to feel like a small child sometimes. They all do. I feel sorry for your DD because you push her away when she might need you the most.

I feel your pain.

Can you park her with a relative while you get your sanity back?

Ignore her and raise this behaviour with her teacher. There's nothing wrong with her and she needs to get her head around the fact she's 8 years, not 8 months old.

My DD's friend did this at a similar age and kept doing it (sorry) for almost 2 years! I couldn't stand to be near her so I feel your pain, she doesn't do it anymore and it was an attention seeking thing, hopefully she will snap out of it soon!

It’s also a pretty good description for a lot of homes where they haven’t.

So OP who knows her daughter, can't say she's not ND because she hasn't been told that by experts, but you, a random on the internet, is perfectly qualified to diagnose her as being autistic.

Surely you can see how dumb that is???
Also nothing wrong with broken home. I'm from one, and actually it's a pretty good description for a lot of people whose parents break up.

This. Thank you @Life2Short4Nonsense I was just going to ask.

Are you sure nothing else has happened? Your daughter’s not been left with a new babysitter, someone else? Regression to babyhood is often a sign of stress, it can happen if the child is ill, it can happen after a life changing event, it can happen after abuse, it can happen after a child has witnessed something upsetting.

edited - my mistake!! Sorry. You’re right.

my child is not neurodivergent nor is she from a broken home. Me and her dad have been together twelve years.

Oh THANK GOODNESS she isnt from a "broken home"!!

That would be just the pits!

ffs - so insulting and patronising. Such a stupid thing to say

I’d do as your partner is doing and totally ignore it.

Well, she is clearly struggling. I would have thought that a parents job is to work out what it is and help rather than ignore.

There is nothing "broken" about any of our homes.

99% of the time I wouldn't feel the need to comment or make any judgement on other people's homes/lives. If necessary, I would say a single parent or lone parent family.

I think the OP's child will be better when she gets back to school where adults won't consider a whole day ruined or start crying and drinking tea just because a little girl is talking in a slightly annoying way.

And I don't believe anyone would have the time, money or inclination to find 3 psychiatrists. What a palaver.