To think a 13 month old cannot say 106 words?

[TinyChatterbox]

Just over a year ago I had my first child and like many did an antenatal group. As lockdown commenced several of us managed to track each other down on Facebook and we started a group chat. There are now 5 of us who were in the original antenatal group in this chat and its been lovely to catch up albeit virtually every now and again.

All 5 of us are first time parents and one of the group boastfully posted yesterday evening that her daughter (who is 13 and 1/2 months) can now say 106 words. Now I'm not disputing she may think her child says that many words but she's talking utter bullshit isn't she. There is absolutely no way her 14 month old actually says 106 words which could be understood by anyone.

It's really pissed me off and I'd love some clarification because one of the mums in the group, who is quite a young mother, has responded in a blind panic that her child who is also 13 months only says 8 words. She's understandably completely freaking out and has messaged the health visitor as there is clearly something wrong with her daughter.

YANBU - The mum is deluded to think her child says 106 words.

YABu - It's perfectly possible a 13 month old can say 106 words.

I suspect she means if she takes the dozen or do syllables that little Einstein makes they can be arranged into 106 words.
e.g. ca, ba, doo, urg, ehh, poo, wah, argh, pee, etc. (last one is not a sound)

Actually I think this has the makings of a new Parlour Game, perhaps called
'My Baby Says... '
Anyone know if Waddingtons are still around?

Its definitely possible - one of mine was putting 2 distinctly separate words together (often name plus verb - "Mummy drive" or "dog gone" or similar) and had a lot of words by 14 months, she also had those melded together sentence words like "goawalk!" for go for a walk by then (similar to my other two at 18 months).

Its the boasting without "reading the room" that's the problem. I know I was tempted to boast about speech because my kids didn't sleep much, and a little part of me wanted revenge on the parents who had made me feel unable to have a grumble about that because they'd been implying for half a year that if my offspring didn't sleep through like theres it was because I was failing at having a lovely bedtime routine.

*theirs not theres

My 14mo says sweet FA. She makes a particular sound for ball, a particular sound for cat, says "geh" when she wants something to happen "again" and will moo to indicate cow, say "gee" for "dog".. I'm a little worried now. Should I be?!

I think it's possible. We adopted DS at nearly 10 months and he came with a couple of words, and he expanded his vocabulary rapidly. He was always crystal clear, although there were some mispronunciations 'ikkle' for 'little' for example. He was my first so I didn't know but other people used to remark on it. His social worker asked out of curiosity how many words he knew when he was about 12 months and I think DH and I did a quick finger count and came up with about 50 or so which heightened our awareness that there were a lot of words, so we kept counting for a few days and I think we got it up over 80. It means nothing in the long term, DS has struggled with school and dropped out half-way through secondary, but he does still have a facility with languages and accents.

DD came along a few years later and resolutely said nothing except 'clocklat biscuit' until she was about two. She's doing far better academically now than DS.

I doubt it’s true. Just look at many grown ups that struggle with 50 words and most of them are swearing words.
Look at it this way if yours talk less it’s peace for your ears while it lasts lol

Never even thought about counting words.

@emilyfrost

it's clearly boastful and she's not at all sorry she's caused the otuer parent to panic that her child isn't saying as many words.

Why should she be sorry? She hasn’t done anything wrong and she isn’t responsible for anyone else’s feelings.

There was honestly no need for her to post, surely bragging about stuff like this is kept to grandparents and partners?

So now you want there to be limits on what gets posted in the group in case it upsets someone else? You don’t want people to post too happy a news in case someone else’s baby isn’t quite there yet?

The mum who posted has done so as if this is completely normal and not at all unusual and has not offered any reassurance that it might actually be pretty uncommon.

She doesn’t need to offer reassurance. She shouldn’t have to think about how to word her news and what assurances she can add to make sure there’s absolutely no chance of someone being oversensitive and becoming upset.

She wants to share her happy news with her friends and for them to be happy for her and her baby. Surely you just all celebrate with each other when each little one hits their own milestone, not compare.

Your answer is so annoying.

I get what you're saying BUT there is a certain amount of tackt that needs to be considered when posting. It's just common sense. I'm also in one of those groups of mums with babies the same age and no one posts what they're baby is up to in much detail. It's not not the done thing. We ask each other things like - are any of the babies walking yet ? How are they getting on with speaking ? The answers are always super considerate- ' yes X is taking a few steps sometimes ' ( even if X is already out there walking a marathon, I would not say it ). Or yes, Y says a few half words now and then. No one gives much detail. People play it down a bit, just to not come across as boastful or upset others. I think it's just tact. Of course if having a meet up / one on one, you actually talk properly, but not in the group.

I get it- no one is responsible for another's feelings and why can't people just be happy etc. But it's best to just keep it quiet if you think your child is a genius. Save it for the grandparents or save it for when people actually see your child and can see for themselves what they're up to.

This is the only thing i didn’t enjoy about nct group, there is always the competitive mum.

We had one who had to be the first to wean, first to crawl/walk or talk.

We all said the right things at the time but it made us all doubt ourselves and worry about development, it was only last year (babies now 2) that rest of the group had mentioned it to each other.

Everyone is doing the best they can and honestly, once they are all 4/5 it really won’t matter.

My DS1 said his first recognisable word at 21 months - I had been beginning to despair. Turned out that's his personality - he won't do anything unless he is sure he is good at it! Full sentences with a pretty rich vocabulary were in place not long after. He's 15 now and I had an email from his English teacher after he did his GCSE English speaking component to say that she and the trainee had rarely heard anyone do so well. The downside of this is that he has an opinion on everything, and expresses it frequently! Please tell your poor friend she has absolutely nothing to worry about and I think 10 words at 13 months is pretty good.

I think it’s rare, but possible. I knew a little girl who could definitely do this (friend’s baby - she never bragged, but it was obvious the child could say a hell of a lot of nouns). Same child was speaking in full sentences at 18 months, to the extent that on a Drs visit, the GP asked “where does it hurt?” and the child was able to say, “my tummy hurts and I feel sick.” It stood out as my own DC was the same age and nowhere near as verbal!

This has prompted me to go back to find DC’s list of words. It’s an reminder of that time, the books we read, the games we played.

OhNo! as an expression of shock that something has gone wrong really took me back along with Careful! for climbing up slide ladders and ReadySteadyGo! which is counted as a single word. And the fact that Snotty is well up the list sums up life with a toddler.

I do however remember having to explain to a babysitter at a slightly younger age that they were not dealing with an extraordinarily sophisticated one year old, and that the Roggit they were being asked for was actually Yoghurt not rocket salad.

Yes it's possible. I filled both sides of an a4 sheet with the words my eldest daughter could say clearly just before her 1st birthday. As a toddler she used to get very frustrated with children of the same age as her who didn't communicate as well and often would migrate towards trying to play with older school aged children. She is 21 now, bright but not exceptional. She had a tendency to be good at english and drama etc at school. My other daughter was far more 'normal' and spoke about 10/15 words around her 1st birthday. It hasn't made a jot of difference to her now she is 16. Some babies are just chatty, some walk early, some are really good at climbing/scrambling, and some have great coordination with shapes or puzzles. It's not an indication of a child being gifted or super intelligent I don't think.

I know that this might feel a big deal to you in your world right now OP....but it really shouldn’t be and any kind of group dialogue that’s making you feel stressed out

I think you might have misunderstood. It's not stressing me out at all its made me cross because she's stressed out a young mum who is now worried her child who is perfectly normal is actually lagging massively behind.

It's also made me sad because the mum who said it doesn't seem to have any empathy for how she's made others feel. Otherwise the chat has been incredibly useful during lockdown as we obviously cannot see other children or parents. Up to now mostly the chat has just been day to day stuff like a quick check in to see how everyone is or asking for puddle suit recommendations etc. It would be a shame to lose the support just because this parent now sees it as a competition.

Is it possible? Absolutely. It's not very common. What we've got to remember as parents is every child is completely different, and try and not compare our child to others.
Hell my daughter is 15 months and has yet to utter a single word other than mama, which she cannot do functionally. If I worried about how many words her peers are saying I'd have driven myself crazy long before now.

Forgot to add to my post- her son started saying words at 1, my daughter didn’t until she was 18/19 months and now she can talk in full sentences (2.5 now) and her son can’t, he can string words together but not full on conversations like we can have with our girl.

Development happens at different stages.

@stickysticks

My son knew over 300 words at 16 months (Counted after a conversation with a health visitor who was curious). He knew his colours and the alphabet which he learnt from kids TV and would shout out the letters on the shopping in the supermarket. One well meaning old lady stopped and said he's a child genius and we ought to get him in one of those special schools. Yeah, he's a a special school now - for children with autism.

This is very similar to what I was about to post.

My child before 2 was speaking in full sentences and knew his alphabet by sight and had started to read.

I KNEW is wasn’t quite as expected and brushed off comments about him being ‘so advanced’.

He’s autistic. He’s in mainstream and quite bright but has whole load of other issues.

@peboh

Is it possible? Absolutely. It's not very common. What we've got to remember as parents is every child is completely different, and try and not compare our child to others. Hell my daughter is 15 months and has yet to utter a single word other than mama, which she cannot do functionally. If I worried about how many words her peers are saying I'd have driven myself crazy long before now.

I'm lying, my daughter is 25 months 🤦🏻‍♀️

My second son is 3 in two weeks and has zero recognisable words.

My first born was probably around that, he was talking in full sentences by 18 months. He's 7 now and bright, but not especially. Still talks a lot!! My second is 18 months and has a handful of words.

I’ve learnt there is a huge range in when kids do things.
My eldest did not utter a single word (not even mama or dada) until he was 2.5 year old. He’s actually super clever and very gifted in literacy.
DD was holding conversations like an adult by 18 months and could say hundreds of words so possibly saying 100 words at 13 months I didn’t count!!
DS2 had hearing issues so needed a lot of speech therapy.

All 3 kids same parents and brought up the same so as you can see a huge variety within one family!

I don't remember being that young but my DM and DF (as well as a lot of my extended family) say I could hold a full conversation at that age. My DS as a baby/toddler couldn't really be bothered to talk and used to abbreviate words and sentences he could say into a minimal series of sounds that I and a few others could understand. On the other hand, he could count low numbers of objects accurately when he was about 7 months old and recognised the written numbers that corresponded with the amount. It was genuinely freaky.

As for the rest, they all develop differently so the younger mum needs to be supported to not worry about it

She doesn’t need supported so much as be told I no uncertain terms that she has absolutely nothing to worry about; that her baby is the normal one and that the other baby is the outlier. The trouble with lockdown is that people can post anything on social media but you don’t get a chance to meet people and see for yourself.

I found it was swings and roundabouts with each of our DC’s developmental milestones. DS1 walked at 10mths, babbled and could kick a ball by 13mths.
DD3 could say mummy cake pwease on her 1st birthday and her speech continued to progress well (not to the op’s friends level by any stretch) She couldn’t crawl until she was 18mths and walked at 22.5mths.

Every child is individual. Boastful parents are not friends.

Comparing babies’ achievements is a recipe for heartache. They all get there in the end. Enjoy your babies they grow up too quickly.