Return of Echolalia

[Eveiebaby]

DD 4.8 (ASD) did go through a period of echolalia and babbling for I guess approx a good few months but it seemed to resolve itself around last summer.

Her main issue at that time was asking us "Do you want something to eat?" type of questions instead of saying "I want something to eat." etc.. but once she finally mastered her I/You pronouns it was no longer a problem. Everything she said seemed to be in context to the situation.

However, these past few days I have noticed that she has started repeating immediate conversations for example today I was having a conversation with a family member and DD was just sat there repeating exactly what I was saying . At school this week there was also and episode where she just randomly spoke in incomprehensible babble for about 15 minutes.

Anyway, my question is have any of you mums experience similar. DD has come on well with her language - still behind her peers by a way - she probably is more like a 3 year old but as we have never had an assessment I'm not really sure.

It feels like she may be regressing and I am worried.

i cant really help but didnt want to read and run, my son has been known to do the repitition thing, but i suppose with everything else in his behaviour i have never personally seen it as a big issue for us, as we have alot more to battle with iykwim, maybe speak with your HV or GP? x

my DS does this and always has done seemed normal when learning to speak and then as hes got older it can be embarassing and i was worried before but kind of used to it now, DS is nearly 11 he is also behind in language although the SLT comments reg that he uses big words totally out of context and it seems he likes the sound of certain words and phrases he hears so keeps repeating them can be amusing at times embarassing at others,as sometimes its naughty words hes overheard he particularly likes B sounding words and often bables bah bah bah and bub bub bub but the way that was explained to me is as i say he likes the sound and feel of the word in his mouth IYSWIM so dont worry your deffinately not alone

Ds wld sometimes lapse back into telly talk echolalia when under the weather, cld be your dd is about to get a bug of some sort

Thanks for your reply Mummy - Betty yes I find it embarrassing but tend to ignore it like I am pretending it's not happening

Total - yes I had thought about her being under the weather but apart from seeming a little more tired than usual and having a couple of horrendous days at school last week where she was hyper nothing obvious. Chickenpox did go around at school a couple of weeks ago but I would have thought she would have caught it by now but maybe not.

Have a look at what she's repeating.

It may very well be a self-comforting thing given that she may be potentially poorly/tired etc.. but given that her history suggests that she used echolalia functionally when she didn't have the "correct" language form, could she perhaps be using it to practice more advanced language skills at the moment?

Some children are "top down" language learners so echo to work out patterns in language and communication that they aren't accessing in the traditional way.. if that makes sense? She may be ready to have a "leap" in terms of what she can say but is trying to work it out at the moment. NT kids do a variety of this when acquiring new forms, but it's less obvious e.g. my 2.5 year old niece uses irregular verbs like "went" while her 3.5 year old sister would say "goed". "Goed" sounds more immature but is actually more advanced, as the earlier use of "went" represents less knowledge of the patterns of language. So there's truth in the two steps forward, one step back being still one step ahead.

Or she may just be tired and stressed..

Thanks working - yes she certainly is tired that does seem to be a bit of a constant issue and she did have the worst few days ever at school last week so she may be stressed.

She did say to me yesterday "I feel happy" to which I was stunned as expressing her original thoughts and feelings is something she cannot do. She cannot tell me why she is upset etc.. I have to ask her half a dozens questions to try to get to the bottom of things.

So it may well be a case that she will have a leap - I really hope so.

eveiebaby We have many of these things with DS2. He is 4yrs and still is slowly working through this. He often goes through stages where it appears he is going backwards instead of forwards, but it seems to correlate with him focusing on something new - rather like the new thing is taking up so much concentration that he cannot focus on both. Then once the new thing is a bit easier on him, he seems to improve again, if that makes sense. He also seems to struggle more when he is tired or ill or distressed.

We often cannot get DS2 to tell us why he is upset - sometimes it means going round and round until you come up with just the right question or the right set of questions in just the right order to get to the problem. And sometimes he is just too upset to communicate effectively at all.

Thanks triggles I find it very hard that DD cannot tell me why she is upset but I am hopeful that as she does have good language skills thoughts and expression will come in time -I hope it does for your DS too.