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

How on earth can somebody see 3 psychiatrists? It must cost thousands?

I once read that rather than correcting a child or pointing out what’s ‘wrong’ that you could repeat the words back to them in a sentence. Eg. “Oh no your hands are sticky” “you don’t like Mummy today”. That way you’re not ignoring her or telling her off but you are reinforcing the use of ‘proper’ language whilst seeing to her needs and acknowledging what she’s said. You’re also not giving rise to the fact she’s using baby talk.

Well this is an only child whose parents must have a large amount of t of disposable income.

OP, you must have other concerns if you've discussed autism with school and have been to three psychologists.

For what it's worth DS was seen by eight psychologists (only one was private) before I suggested autism and they agreed. Teachers always said they weren't qualified to comment.

Personally I wouldn't say a firm no thank you to the baby voice, but give loads of hugs and attention and more bed time stories than usual. I'd very clearly tell her she needs to communicate clearly for people to understand her and want to interact with her. So a two pronged approach of telling her to speak properly, but at the same time nurturing her as much possible, if if that seems like you are "babying" her. I doubt she will use the voice when she goes into school in Y4- and so might use it even more at home. If she does use it at school then I'd ask for the school to refer her to be seen by the educational psychologist.

Does she use the baby talk in her writing at school at all?

Yes, you're right. I forget sometimes that people have funds at the ready.

Thanks

Only thing i will add to the '3 psychologists and the teachers all say she isn't autistic' thing is i had a paediatrician, and loads of teachers say my son wasn't autistic before he was 8.

By 11 he was diagnosed with severe dyspraxia (causes a 20% emotional/social delay) and both Autism & ADHD.

I am still not going to armchair diagnose the child the thread is about, its just to say that professionals are not always correct.

OP I would completely ignore. She’s attention seeking and will stop when it doesn’t work.
If she hasn’t stopped by year 4, u guarantee her teacher bollocking her in from if her classmates or her friends embarrassing her will stop her from doing it!

Teachers can't tell you whether a child had autism or not.

The fact your daughter had seen 3 psychiatrists says there is more going on here than a bit of baby talk which has apparently had only happened 'lately'.

I wouldn't take the teachers' word for it...none of them thought DD was autistic but she is. 8 was when it started to show more obviously.

Psychiatrists on the other hand...more likely to know if they've been trained in NDs.

Good luck with sorting out what is going on. Even if she were autistic,say, no point going for an assessment until there is enough evidence... clearly not at the moment! DD might have been diagnosed at 8 but maybe not enough clear evidence...

She's 8 that's still very young to me , iv'e had three 8 year old's .
Perhaps going up a year is scary for her and she just wants to cling on to being a little girl for a bit longer , she probably has some awareness that more will be asked of her at school come September, especially if she has some trepidation about the teacher.
If she were mine i would not be commenting on the voice at all but i would be giving her plenty of comfort at home and positive comments about how year 4 maybe , plant a few seeds about how the new teacher may behave but how even though he is different he is nice and ie if he has a louder voice this doesn't mean he is angry at her -you get the picture .
I bet you will find once she gets back to school peer pressure will make her 'conform' to some degree and she will be back to normal fairly soon.
I remember when my middle one started to blink a lot probably around the same age, god knows why thankfully it didn't last long !
Even though lots of things our kids do will cause us to worry at the time i found most things are just a phase that passes.

Because the OP keeps changing her story ….

I can’t fathom why she mentioned them in the first place. 🤣

Such sharp division on how to approach.
I'm team I'd very clearly tell her she needs to communicate clearly for people to understand her and want to interact with her. So a two pronged approach of telling her to speak properly, but at the same time nurturing her as much possible,

and I'm horrified by this
OP I would completely ignore. She’s attention seeking and will stop when it doesn’t work.
If she hasn’t stopped by year 4, u guarantee her teacher bollocking her in from if her classmates or her friends embarrassing her will stop her from doing it!

She's 8 and she's deemed to be attention seeking. When did it become such a heinous crime for a child to seek attention that a bollocking by a person in power and public humiliation is thought to be appropriate?
It's not abnormal to want attention, it's not unusual for a child to lack emotional maturity and to not know how to handle powerful feelings in an appropriate way.

It’s actually normal for adults to want attention. We just tend to have more nuanced ways of getting it.

Quite.

It’s an example of parenting by shaming- the classic example of which is the dunce’s cap.

I agree about the parenting by shaming, but I don’t think it would be unreasonable to say something like:

”You are talking like a baby, but I’m sure you don’t want to be treated like one. Babies have to go to bed much earlier and don’t get to do/watch/eat all these things (list) that you enjoy, so let’s stop the baby talk and be the big girl who gets to do the things big girls do. I love my big girl and I want you to be happy and have fun, and if you are worrying about something, we can talk about it.”

I do agree with the posters who have suggested that your delay we’ll have picked up on the tension in the house, and this could be causing the behaviour, and an edited, age-appropriate explanation with lots of reassurance may be what she needs right now, @Maryahadaballtoday.

You don't have to tell her that but you could say something like daddy has been a bit worried because someone was mean to him at work. But we're sorting it out and it's all fine. That would be something she could understand, a bit like what might happen at school. Also you could ask her if anyone has been mean to her at school.

It may be nothing to do with it but it's something you could try that's within your control.

If she's still doing the baby voice maybe try distraction. So rather than ignore her (which might exacerbate it if she's doing it for attention) then talk about something completely different that doesn't require a response from her.

It all sounds very frustrating for you and when this kind of thing happens it feels like it's going to go on forever! My worse time was when my son wouldn't go to bed and the advice then was to put them back to bed without any reaction (I don't know if that's still the advice). Anyway one night I did it 200 times. In the end I wanted to scream. The 'experts' on TV all managed it after ten-twenty times. Infuriating.

He did stop it eventually but I empathise with you as it was exasperating. BTW can you sometimes tag team and leave it up to her dad to deal with it so you get a break?

She infantilising herself to avoid the OP’s too-grown-up expectations of her? Making herself seem vulnerable and “cute” in an unconscious bid to be cared for/nurtured?

Have you tried asking her what’s going on, OP?

Hey OP,

Sounds fecking maddening, don't blame you for feeling strung out.

I would say it sounds as if she's feeling insecure about growing up and this is her way of processing some of the changes she's going through, especially if she's found it gets a reaction and attention from mum and dad.

I wouldn't worry too much about school because if anything, that'll bring her back to earth sharpish, especially if you think the teacher won't have any of it. I'm a secondary teacher myself and it's very common for parents to tell us about behaviours at home that children would never dream of in front of their peers. If she gets a sharp telling off from the teacher, or her peers roll their eyes and think she's a baby... I imagine she'll stop very quickly.

In the meantime, for your sanity... if it were one of mine, I think I'd go for one of three options:

1. A sharp telling off, as a one off, then calm sending to room each time it started up again. "X, I don't like that voice. Go to your room and come out when you are ready to talk normally'. Lather, rince, repeat.

2. Treat her like a baby. You said that she was watching a film in her room, that's not a privilege for big girls. Babies go to bed early and have quiet time during the day. I imagine she'll get very tired of 6pm bedtimes.

3. Ignore. No attention whatsoever for use of the baby voice/behaviours. With the ice cream scenario for example, I'd have just walked off.

Anyway, my deepest sympathies. It sounds exhausting and I felt irritated just reading your OP! Hang tight, school is just round the corner and I imagine this short, albeit very annoying, stage will soon be over.

no one reads the whole thread! 16 pages! haha

Tubes tied is the kind of thing my mother would say and she’s 82. Along with broken home……

I have to say I hadn’t heard it for a while.

I'm flabbergasted at the number of people suggesting everything from mental disturbance to abuse and emotional damage as a "reason" for this.

Nearly all children- especially girls- go through a baby-talk phase. Sometimes, there's a reason, most commonly they mistakenly believe that it's "cute" and will help them to win adult approval.

On it's own, it's not a symptom of anything except it's a thing that kids do and it's really annoying.

I disagree. I don't think it necessarily is a sign of a big problem. But my kids definitely did this for a reason. My DD reverted to baby talk when she felt like the younger ones were taking up all my time. My son still does it when he's really stressed and worked up about something.

With my dd I started to give her more 1 on 1 time. And when my son starts at it, I can usually figure out what is stressing him out,

All behaviour is communication at the end of the day. Particularly annoying behaviour.