7yr old making a weird gulping noise all the time

[oinkment]

I can't decide if she's gulping air or clearing her throat or pushing air into the back of her nose. It's rhythmic and she does it when eating, sucking her thumb, reading, going to sleep. She had ENT issues when younger but she's been fine for a long time now, apart from chronic inflammation of the nasal passages resulting in dark brown/green bogies all the time.

I took her to the doctor but she messed around so much he was unable to examine her or give us any answers.

If I tell her to stop gulping she can and does, but i dont think she realises shes doing it until i say something. It might just be a habit or tic. I don't want her to get teased about it.

Any ideas?

DS1 has this and has had since he was about 4. It's a tic and it gets worse when he is tired. He gulps, says yes and nods and used to do an odd yawny thing. It seems quite involuntary and although he can stop if you mention it to him, he starts again straight away. He is 7 too btw, 8 in November. We ignore it really but do take it as a cue that he is tired and may need to ie stop playing on Minecraft etc! Teachers have mentioned it but AFAIK he doesn't get teased about it at school. It doesn't seem to bother him at all

I used to do that - in fact, reading this has started me off again! It was a habit - I felt like I always had air trapped in my throat, and flexing the muscles used to shift the feeling up or down (neither of which was comfortable). I found that swallowing slowly and deliberately took the discomfort away, and I sucked mints for a whole to break the habit :).

And I made DD1 sing.

I'm sure with her was a sort of stress tic.

She is a seriously good, passes exams, singer. When she sings she really concentrates and the gulping and swallowing goes away.

Became a house joke that I'd look at her and she'd sing something.

Thank you everyone.

I hadn't noticed but now I realise it probably is a tired thing. Definitely more at the end of the day.