Daughter refusing to speak normally

[Maryahadaballtoday]

I’m at my bloody wits end with my child and I’m very close to telling her so.

I have one child (daughter she’s eight) she is my only child as a few years ago I had my tubes tied neither me or partner wanted another daughter - perfectly fine with just one and she has plenty of cousins and friends to spend time with. I

Its worth noting before I go on that my child is not neurodivergent nor is she from a broken home. Me and her dad have been together twelve years. We have never broken up nor divorced either, partly because we’ve never been married. So there’s really no need for her to be doing what she does.

Lately she has been reverting back to baby speech - saying things like chippies or icky, the worst is bobo when she wants her water bottle and it’s grinding my gears to the maximum. It’s gotten so bad that my partner will flat out ignore her.

Earlier on today she had a full on temper tantrum and kept screaming “icky icky icky” over ice cream spilling on her fingers while we were out. When I pulled her up on to her feet and sternly told her she was on thin ice she reverted back to baby speech “I no wike you” was among my top five favourites.

AIBU to ignore her like my partner is doing? Is this a phase she’ll grow out of? I’m dreading sending her back to school the week after next because her baby talk has got so bad none of her friends have wanted to spend time all summer

I really don’t need the shaming mum parade, I’d like a hand hold and for someone to tell me their kid has also been driving them beserk too

although I know I’m likely to be flamed - Mumsnet seems to be that way

Put her on the naughty corner every time she does it

Your daughter is going through a phase. Kids often do have phases of speaking differently, sometimes different accents, words, etc, in your one's case it is reverting to baby language. However not every word will be in 'baby'. just some.

The more annoyed you are about this, the more she will do it! Chill. This will pass.

Wow, get out that slegde-hammer and smash that walnut!

it's likely a phase but the fact she's doing it in front of her friends too is a concern. Not to flame you at all but would it be worth exploring your wording behind 'not wanting another daughter'? that's maybe quite telling in some way? Maybe she's speaking like that as a source of comfort, although she's clearly not getting any comfort from it (i don't mean you're doing anything wrong btw) maybe she want's to go back to a nicer time for her, did you treat her differently in terms of how much affection she got when she was a younger? I feel like it's more than just trying to annoy you or get a rise because she's doing it with her friends too. If it was me, I would look at myself and her dad firstly, no blaming here, just that it's easier to change yourself than it is an 8 year old child and I wouldn't be doing a punishment or naughty step as some have suggested because she clearly isn't doing this out of badness so why would you punish her? Surely if it's a coping mechanism for something then punishing will make it worse and she'll just find a bigger more problematic coping mechanism down the line. Something clearly isn't ok, it maybe feels a little bit to me like no one really want's her to be honest. It's just the vibe i get from your posts and please know I am NOT judging you at all OP, not at all. It's not bloody easy. X

Another one with a sledge-hammer.
Jesus, you want to jump straight into 'professional' help? I suppose you tell the doctor you have a brain tumour before you've tried an aspirin for your headache.
As most have said, it's probably a phase. They've provided handy hints to help. Why the overkill?

please no one ever, ever follow this advice ever.

People here have described two very different kinds of ignoring. There's "pretend (s)he's speaking normally" and there's "refuse to respond to any requests or conversations in baby language"

Given the family circumstances you've described I would do the first kind with your DD. Let her do babytalk and respond as if she's spoken normally. My own DS didn't do babytalk but he had other annoying comms issues that I wont go into now, and that's how DH and I managed them.

Try voluntarily giving her some baby-attention - cuddles, a bit of lovingly babying her yourself - at times that she doesn't initiate with babytalk.

And yes, I'm very sorry she's driving you bersek with it. That's part of why she's doing it! One if the times you described her doing it was when she was angry with you for not helping her with the spilt icecream and for scolding her instead. It's a frustrated-kid thing - she expresses her own inarticulate helpless rage by making you feel the same way! Kids are expert button pushers, try not to let the babytalk push yours.

I did this age 10 (year 6). I can't remember doing it to my parents but I was undiagnosed autistic, and feeling under a lot of pressure and existential stress. I think you should be supportive of her as she needs comfort and explore what's going on for her. It sounds annoying.

She’s already been seen by a psychologist…

She may be picking up that something is going on? Some children resort to baby speech when anxious. It can then be very hard to get out of the habit.

Are you able to take some time off? For your wellbeing, see if you being less stressed helps?

Assuming she is not ND then this is classic attention seeking behaviour. She knows it 'grinds your gears' (horrible phrase) and annoys her dad but continues to do it - because any attention, even negative attention, is better than no attention.

As a retired psychotherapist who worked extensively with young people I feel very strongly about attention seeking behaviour. People don't do it for fun or to wind other people up. If people are seeking attention it's because they need it. And as the parents of this girl it's your job to give her what she needs, not withdraw from her because you find her irritating.

This is a vicious circle. The more she tries to get your attention with baby talk the more you pull back from her , so she ups the baby talk to get some (negative) emotional response from you.

Can you find a positive way to react to this without endorsing or enabling the baby talk? Give her hugs and cuddles maybe while responding to her baby talk with more age appropriate language somignore the baby talk but respond in normal speech? Make sure she knows that your love/attention isn't conditional on her talking and behaving in a way you approve of?

Remember, she is only 8. This behaviour didn't come from nowhere, it's telling you something.

EDIT- I've just read your latest update. I'm sorry you are having a hard time atm but that could explain why her baby talk is escalating. She is aware your attention is elsewhere and trying to draw it back to her.

I know you say you have kept the adult issues from her (and well done for that) but 90% of communication is non verbal and on an unconscious level she will be aware that something bad is going on and is craving attention and the reassurance that gives her.

I wouldn't worry about her future or school at this point. If she is able to have a proper conversation with psychiatrists and counsellors (probably because they are giving her 100% of their attention in the moment) she will be able to modify her behaviour in other situations too. She sounds like a smart little girl to me!

can you do a duolingo for her, both learn french or german or something.

I think this stems from boredom. She's trying to get a rise out of you because you're the main person she interacts with and it puts the attention on her. At her age she needs activities which will physically exhaust her, especially earlier in the day and she needs to be mentally challenged, maybe by giving her more trust and responsibilities. I do lots of this sort of work with kids as part of my job.

i have it in writing from three psychiatrists and most of her teachers at school have told me she isn’t autistic.

This is very strange. I assume you've seen these psychiatrists privately. There's no way the NHS would have referred a child to 3 psychiatrist; not in the short period of time this has been happening.

I think your daughter has got into this habit and she can see you are paying attention to it, so she keeps on doing it. I would do the same as her dad and just ignore the baby talk. When she's back at school, busy with her friends and studies, she'll grow out of it. Yes, she'll get laughed at or ignored by other children, but there's nothing you can do about that. She'll have to learn the hard way

How come it takes a panel of experts to declare her not neurodivergent but all it takes is you, an online mnetter, to declare her neurodivergent? Just out of interest.

I'd plan a day out getting new things for school.

But baby girls' don't go to school do they? Oh dear maybe one of her cousins would like to go instead?

Why has she been assessed by so many psychiatrists at her age?
How long has this been going on for?

You don't wish you could have more children though, you said in your opening post you'd had your "tubes tied" a few years ago as you didn't want another daughter. I don't like to be so pedantic but that's quite a specific thing to say.

Perhaps she is trying to be the new baby you long for?

my dd age 8 was desperate for me to have a baby.
just a phase op

This is a child who has allegedly seen three psychiatrists and whose teachers have been discussing the possibility of autism. Bit more than a walnut, maybe?

This. 👆
If you're not a specialist you can't know if there's no ND going on. For some reason DD is reversing which is a big red flag & should be listened to, not ignored.

Try to read a whole thread, by that I mean just click ‘see all’ on an OP’s posts.

You've just reminded me that one of my DC started to do this during the first lockdown. Not all the time, but enough that we noticed. I just treated it like it was normal, felt that it was probably triggered by the changes to her world. She was in yr4.

DH kept saying things like, 'I just can't take you seriously when you talk like that' and 'you just sound really stupid'. I went with it/ felt that she obviously needed to do it for some reason. It didn't actually matter. (Maybe lockdown helped as no interaction with anyone else, and she didn't do it all the time.)

She still does the odd bit at 12, and tbh I do it sometimes too. It's become a way of bonding. DH eventually just ignored it. Not making a big deal made it ok and I saw it as some kind of self-soothing.

So I suppose the advice I'd give is, don't make a big deal out of it. That might be too late in your case, though. Perhaps I'm a soft touch, but she needed to do it, we didn't make a big deal of it. So much so that it didn't immediately spring to mind when I read your OP

It’s really obvious that there’s massive bits missing or that’s not true. So all the speculation in the world won’t help.

Op said she had her tubes tied because they did want another daughter (which I think is odd phrasing but ok) then says they would love another baby but can’t due to BOTH parents having long covid. Either Op has being misleading or their long covid is so bad op took the drastic decision to have her tubes tied. Which is a huge decision and huge thing to go through, if you are already so poorly you can not ever contemplate having another child.

If both parents are so poorly, their daughter has definitely been impacted.

Then the 3 visits to psychiatrists and the conversations with school. Clearly all is not well and this isn’t the only issue. Children who have no issues don’t have their parents and teachers discussing the possibility of autism or multiple visits to 3 different psychiatrists.

Either the Op is chatting shit completely

Or the child hasn’t had the appointments and meetings with school and just made it up to try and prove her daughter is not autistic. And also made up part of why they aren’t having kids.

Or in complete denial and thinks they can tackle this like the parent of a child with no issues could, which will negatively impact the child.

Or the Op has some sort of medical anxiety and is taking her daughter to appointments she doesn’t need and having conversations with teachers that she doesn’t to have. Which will negatively impact the child.

The problem is, without all the information no one can say with any certainty that the Dd could be autistic or not, wether it’s just a phase or not, what the reason could be, wether it’s normal and will resolve itself.

I suspect there’s far more issues at play with the Op.