Stutter in 3.5 year old

[NC28]

Just looking for experiences.

My son is almost 3.5 and speech has always been fine. Has been holding conversations for a while and no delay of onset of speech etc.

I’ve noticed he’s started stuttering a lot. Some examples are:

L-l-l-l-let’s go!

I-I-I-I-I want to go to the park!

W-w-w-we can go over here now.

It doesn’t seem to occur only when he’s excited or in a hurry to speak (he never bloody stops talking though!). Nursery haven’t mentioned a thing and although I’ve noticed a couple of stumbles over words before, this is much more. Seems to have increased a lot since this morning, no rhyme or reason.

I’ll phone the health visitor on Monday of course, and speak to nursery. Just looking for some experiences or insight as I’m really quite concerned.

Help!

It's actually quite a common thing and they generally grow out of it and sometimes quite quickly. Don't draw attention to it and see how it goes.

Don’t worry, it sounds like a developmental stutter. My son gets it from time to time when his brain is taking a leap. He had a week aged three where he could hardly talk at all, but it passed. You could give it a few weeks before taking him somewhere.

My youngest was like this, again only when excited to tell us something/go somewhere or when upset. She’s now 4.5 years old and doesn’t ever do it

This sometimes happens when a child’s brain is going faster than their mouth! The thoughts are running away and the words take a while to keep up. It often goes away on its own.

Thanks for the replies. I had googled it and seen similar. I’m hoping that it’ll go as quickly as it came. It does seem to increase when he’s excited, but is definitely also there when he’s calm.

He’s an absolute chatterbox, always has been, so maybe it is just developmental.
Will maybe hold off on the HV for now and just ask nursery for their thoughts on it.

Speech therapist here. Unless you’ve got a family history of stammering this isn’t something to worry about, it’s most likely developmental and 90% + of the time it will go away on it’s own.

Id really recommend downloading the Penguin app and following their advice for the next few days. The main thing at the moment though is not make a big deal of, just focus on what he’s saying rather than how he’s saying it. Definitely don’t tell him to slow down or take a breath. Remember it’s probably more worrying for people around your son than it is for him right now, we want to keep it that way.

If it keeps going for 6 months or he becomes very distressed by it then you might want to talk to your local speech and language therapy team.

Oh; and just because it is happening more at the moment doesn’t mean that this is something that is going to stick. It is completely normal for stammer to fluctuate over time.

My son always has it in almost every interaction for a week or two, it’s not only when excited for him. It’s about every 18 months (he’s nearly 7). When it passes it’s like he’s levelled up in his language (he’s also a chatterbox so brace yourself for even more complex conversations in a couple of weeks).

@Sometimesnot Thanks for your insight. We haven’t mentioned it to him at all, and he seems to be totally unbothered by it. No signs of frustration, he’s just his normal self otherwise. I’ve made sure to be purposefully blasé about it, so that he doesn’t become aware of it.

I’m sort of hoping that the nursery will tell me that half the kids they’ve ever looked after do the same.

I’ll download that app, thank you.

My son many years ago had this about the same age. Like you I was worried but it only lasted a few months and then it went away as fast as it started never to return.