Why do MY kids seem to talk so much more than others?

[Spidermama]

I have four children aged 10, 9, 7 and 4 and they talk to me non stop. I can't get away with a simple 'hmm' or 'uh huh' in response either. I always have to look at their art work several times before it has finished.

It's driving me mad.

But for the odd day or two DH is away touring from now until Septemper.

I look around at other kids in the parks and playgrounds and they don't seem to demand as much attention as mine do. DH is a big talker and also demands my attention. I'm wondering if they ALL take after him.

It's a pity because my family were the opposite. We barely talk to each other and so that's the way I was brought up.

I'm utterly craving some head space and I really think I might flip out if it goes on like this throughout the summer holidays.

Any advice or words of support, sympathy, understanding?

I'm off to heave my heavy bones up to the school run.

[Horton]

DD in her bath tonight picked up a cup and spoke into it. She said 'Attention, please! Attention, everyone! Listen to MEEEEEEE!' and I felt a lot tireder than I had before she said it.

She definitely gets it from her dad. In our child-free days, I often had to say to him 'Now just leave me alone for TEN MINUTES or I will scream'. He once said in the car as we were driving along 'What an unusual junction' and I honestly think it was just for something to say. Who on earth rates junctions on unusualness?

Spidermama, am in awe of you coping more or less on your own all summer. That sounds like very hard work. Hope you can organise some time where the children are all out at the same time, for your sake! What's the book where they chuck all the children out into the garden and offer a fiver to the one who comes in last? Maybe you could adopt that approach!

[KTNoo]

Redlentil indeed you are not over the worst yet. I knew when dd2 (dc3) was a baby that it was only going to get worse when she could talk, however being prepared hasn't helped me deal with it any better!

I tell them if they talk to me in the car I WILL crash.

When bombarded with questions I tell them they can all have one more then that's it, so make it a good one.

Friends of mine with quiet passive children think I'm a bit of a wicked witch, but I have to enforce these things occasionally for my sanity.

DH is one of 4 siblings and the incessant chat really doesn't bother him. He can completely zone them out. He works long hours so the dcs are used to saying "Mummy" and not "Daddy" so I have to re-train them at weekends.

[bruces]

So glad it's not only my children who have mouths that run like water,on school mornings when we get out of the house i say they can't talk until we get to a certain letter box..........which gives me about 5mins peace sad i know but helps to keep me sane! also i go to the toilet at home and say i'm doing a poo because if i say a wee in their language it means "come and talk at me" and 99.9% of the time i'm flipping through a magazine and enjoying the silence........while it last

[Horton]

I'm one of four siblings but we were and are quiet and reflective people. We talk but we don't batter people into submission with it!

Apparently when I'm not here, DD says 'Mummymummymummy....' [long pause] 'Daddy?'

[KTNoo]

oooh just thought of another one I do....closing my eyes while sitting on the sofa. For some reason they are more likely to leave me alone.

I tend to save the tv-viewing for while I'm cooking. I've become quite an accomplished cook these last few years - they are supposed to leave me alone so I can cook their dinner. Eventually they are going to work out that it's the time alone I like rather than going for masterchef.

There's a family of 4 kids at school who are all unbelievably quiet. They all stand next to the mum in silence after school if she wants to chat to other mums, while I fend off stories and questions and demands for immediate snacks. During one particularly bad pick-up I had had enough and said to my dcs "Look at those children! Why can't you stand quietly like they do?!" We had about a 10 second pause before dd1 comes back with "Well, THEY don't even reply if you speak to them." She's always got an answer that girl.

[RedLentil]

Spidermama - I'm one of four noisy girls, and it's fair to say that we happen to the world rather than letting it happen to us.

However, when I worked it was in a very cerebral job.

My students have always been v. impressed that I can set 25 of them to work in groups, and then sit in the middle and fire questions and observations into each of the five sub-groups, listening to all of their conversations at once (even hearing what 4 other groups are saying while I'm talking to the fifth one).

Tis a kind of aural/verbal juggling ... It just drives me mad when my dc do it.

[RedLentil]

KTnoo - I like your style.

[KTNoo]

Pleased to help RedLentil.

[Spidermama]

It's such a releif to hear of similar stories and to feel I'm not the only one with noisy, chatty kids.

Horton ROFL about your DH's 'unusual junction' comment. He sounds so like my DH. Mine will say, tingling with anticipation, 'Do you know WHY a sofa is so called?' and I know the next half hour of my life will be given over to a fullsome explanation involving intricate details of our history.

I actually have foam ear plugs in every room of the house easily accessible for when I feel the rising irritation. I bulk buy them on ebay.

KTNoo when mine are in the car they keep saying 'Look mummy I can do Michael Jackson' or 'Look, mummy. Look. Look. Look. MUM! Look at me' then I say 'If I look at you I will definitely crash the car and we'll all be very badly hurt'.
Also 'demand for immediate snacks' ... Yes. I recongise this. Also demands for water wherever we happen to be. Constant demands and constant commentary on their lives. All four of them. All together. FIve when DH is at home.

[Spidermama]

Redlentil that's impressive. I certainly don't share your talent. If two people are talking at the same time on Question Time I get panicky and short of breath so you can only imagine ...

[throckenholt]

2 out of my 3 are like that - they are 6.5 year old twins and haven't stopped talking since they started !

Often I just need peace - I need then to shut up.

And often they just talk drivel - constantly asking what time something is happening, how old you are, telling me how old the rest of the family are ......

Oddly - if I ask them specific questions, or even general questions about what they have done at school - they can't remember anything (except playtime and lunchtime - mind you DS1 remembers even less it seems !).

Total empathy for you.

[KTNoo]

Spidermama your dcs sound scarily similar to mine.

I think it's the combination of them being so talkative and me being so in need of quiet and head space that makes it all so stressful. Whereas dh seems so relaxed amongst the noise of all 3 of them talking at the same time, I'm trying to constantly impose order in what must seem to an outsider like military fashion.

With the snacks/drinks thing, I have started saying before we go out "This is where we eat, drink and go to the toilet. You can't do any of these things once we have left the house". It sounds so retentive even just reading that back to myself, but I really say it.

Off to order some ear plugs....

[KTNoo]

And believe it or not, Spidermama, we are thinking about a dc4!

[ABetaDad]

DW often says "Right, I want 5 minutes silence". She means means me and the kids.

[lovelymumma]

I have 3 girls who talk and argue non stop.My husband says he imagines them in years to come as 3 old ladies nattering on a coach trip,and imagines they'll still be non stop then.I have very long toilet sessions where I lock myself in until i get pins and needles in my legs and it seems to give me some head space although my youngest whose 7 still tries to come in with me.Too much information,hey!

[oneplusone]

HILARIOUS thread! Is there space in the boat for one more? DD (5) has also talked non-stop from around the age of 1. I remember when she was younger and i was putting her to bed, she would be chatting away and then all of sudden fall asleep mid-sentence!

DS (3) who i was hoping would be quieter has suddenly also started talking nearly non stop too.

I am a quite reflective person so the chatter does do my head in, i do tell DD to stop talking sometimes as it's making my head hurt. DH seems to be able to zone it all out, i think he's used to years of zoning out his mother who also talks non-stop (I blame her for DD's motor mouth)

[Spidermama]

All the best with number 4 KTNoo.
You never know (S)he might turn out to be the quiet, orderly one. There might even be a touch of OCD if you're really lucky.

[Spidermama]

oneplusone I wonder if there's a link here. My DH also has a loud mum who talks almost non stop so he can zone out the racket. It's funny but the only time DH isn't talking is when MIL comes to visit.

[KTNoo]

Today we went on a train and ds was so excited he just did not shut up for the entire journey. He wanted to know the name of everything he could see out of the window - after a while my answer to him (heard by whole carriage) was "I DON'T BLOODY KNOW!" Not one of my finer parenting moments.

None of my children seem to "internalise" anything - every thought they have needs to come out of their mouths. I've tried explaining to them that lots of thoughts can stay in your head, but they just looked at me like I was mad.

[KTNoo]

Thanks, Spidermama, but don't hold out much hope for that! Someone once said to me that I could have 100 children and I wouldn't get a quiet passive one.

[Spidermama]

Sorry about your train journey. I had a four and a half hour train journey last week alone with the kids so you have my complete sympathy.

I don't know what possessed me to bring a book as I didn't get to read a word. I should have known better.

They talked, argued loudly, squirmed around the carriage and got up and down to go to the loo constantly, dropped the now unlidded pens I'd brought over and over again and bashed into the seat of the person in front whilst retrieving them.

Some passengers looked at me with sympathy. Others were white knuckled and clearly assumed it was all my fault.

[Spidermama]

I remember going on a plane once with two of mine. DS2 who was 6 at the time and ds4 who was 1. When we finally got on the plane (had rapidly to change plans as pushchair was NOT allowed as hang luggage after all despite telephone assurances during booking) we had to sit in the two seats next to a young woman with a book.

DS4 thrashed around on my knee all sweaty as the plane's take off was delayed for an hour and DS2 talked absolutely non stop about clouds, planes 'How high will we be? Does the queen go on a plane? How does it stay up?' It was literally non stop.

I tried to catch the window woman's eye but she was staring straight out of the window, white knuckled gripping the book. Honestly she was fuming. By the end of the flight I felt like saying, through my tears, 'Huh! You think it's bad for YOU. At least you can peel off now. They're comeng WITH me!'

Then there's the terrible guilt for feeling this way about them even though they're not being naughty.

[KTNoo]

You have my sympathy - I have had many simliar plane experiences. Bit better now that they all have their own seats, and one of them can read her own book at least. I shamelessly get them to ask the cabin crew for help opening their drinks and to take them to the toilet!

[Horton]

"Mine will say, tingling with anticipation, 'Do you know WHY a sofa is so called?' and I know the next half hour of my life will be given over to a fullsome explanation involving intricate details of our history."

Does yours say 'Oooh, interesting!' and then pause, meaningfully, so that you just have to say 'what?' to be polite and you just know that it totally won't be and he will spend the next half hour telling you all about how cranes work or what exactly they do at sewage works? Because if he does, we may be married to the same man. Although DH is not on tour over the summer. He does work in theatre, though, so in a parallel life I suppose he could have been. I really hate the feeling of earplugs or I would have resorted to them long ago. Mine even says 'interesting!' in his sleep.

[IneedacleanerIamalazyslattern]

Tell you what Spidermama i'll give you my phone number and you can pitch your dc's against my dd. She never ever ever stops, even her poor brother at night you can hear her going "A are you awake??? A, A, A are you awake??" she gets no answer but doesn't let that stop her
She asked me a question yeaterday I answered it and in her pause for breath told her I was nipping to the loo...she followed me of course still chatting away..I shut the door she continued talking through the door..nothing like that to give you stage fright
I end up feeling guilty especially as DS had such bad speech delay and I was desperate for him to talk but she more than made up for it.

I have tried the quiet place/room/ hiding in the garden for 5 minutes and none of them work she just cannot manage to stop for a second.
When she was ds was a small baby, was going to a friends house for dinner I was grabbing a few bits in the shops that friend had asked for and she was chattering away so I said ok let's have a competition see who can stay quietest the longest. She peered into the pram and said "my brother will win, he's asleep" in that instant I realised my 3 year old was smarter than me and I was fighting a never ending battle.