The situation when a child began to speak, but suddenly stopped, is unfortunately familiar to many parents; it causes no less anxiety than a complete absence of speech. Such setbacks are often temporary, but do not always go away on their own, so under no circumstances should you delay visiting a specialist. In addition, you may make a mistake with the probable cause and waste time. To properly help a child, it is necessary to first establish the exact cause of the loss of speech. Let's look at the most common cases.
The child stopped speaking at the age of 1-1.5 years, although he already knows several babbling words.
Most often, the baby refuses to speak because the parents demand too much from him and force him to repeat words over and over again. Such small children are simply not ready for such stress, so they become silent due to extreme fatigue.
Solution: Leave the baby alone, do not put pressure on him. When he speaks again, don't repeat the same mistakes. The return of speech may take several days or a month. There is no need to panic, but be sure to show your child to a neurologist to rule out diseases of the central nervous system.
Disease
In some cases, speech disappears if the infection has affected the organs of the respiratory system and caused an increase in body temperature. This happens especially often in very young children who are just starting to speak. In more severe situations, the infection affects the speech centers of the brain and auditory receptors.
Solution: As a rule, speech is restored to its previous volume after recovery from colds, so special help is not required. If the child has suffered a severe infection, he should be immediately checked by a neurologist and otolaryngologist. The sooner treatment and correction are started, the more speech will return to the baby.
Baby becomes silent in front of strangers
Silence is a natural defensive reaction of the body when a child encounters a stranger, especially if he seems scary or simply somehow incomprehensible. Lack of speech may occur for several hours after the meeting.
Solution: If your baby fell silent immediately after your meeting with a stranger, then most likely he will speak before going to bed. Be sure to have a friendly conversation with him about the stranger, tell him that he is a good person who poses no danger, and that his parents like to communicate with him. The child should feel that you are completely safe with him, and next time he will worry less.
What to do
- If the reason is the increased demands of the baby’s mother and father, then your task is to leave the child alone. Do not interfere in the current situation. The little one will speak again when the time comes. And then there is no need to repeat the mistakes you have made and apply pressure again. Everything has its time. You should be prepared for the fact that this process of speech restoration may take a long time; no one knows whether it will take a week or a month. In such a situation, consultation with a specialist is still recommended. In addition, you may be wrong about the suspected cause.
- If a change of environment is to blame, wait a little; most likely, the child will adapt and the speech problems will disappear on their own.
- When speech loss is accompanied by an illness, this problem does not require special treatment. It is enough to carry out the basic procedures for healing from the disease, and speech function will be restored immediately.
- If the child remains silent after your conversation with a person unfamiliar to the baby, then do not be alarmed; most likely, the little one will speak before the end of the day. There is no need to use special methods. The only thing you can do is, after breaking up with the stranger, talk to your little one, tell him that this person is very good, he helps you, that his mother likes to be friends with him. The main thing is that the baby feels your positive attitude and understands that there is no danger for him or for his mother.
- If the cause of this condition is severe stress or fear, you cannot do without consulting a psychologist. The doctor will be able to conduct special sessions and tell you what exercises to do at home with your child. And soon everything will get better.
- If the child’s silence is provoked by increased guardianship on the part of the parents, then you should think about your behavior. In such a situation, a family visit to a psychologist would not be out of place, although initially only the mother can come to the session. Often, with our arrogant guardianship and love, we literally “cut off the child’s oxygen,” then in such a situation it is necessary to start solving the problem with the parents, and only then deal with the baby, if the need for this still remains.
- If the child’s silence is accompanied by additional symptoms, you suspect problems in the functioning of the brain, especially if the child hit his head the day before, then you must urgently call an ambulance and begin a course of medication and related procedures.
- We should not forget about the possibility that such a condition may be a symptom of a psychological disorder. That is why the most vigilant parents rush to show their baby to a specialist, especially if there are cases of mental illness in the family.
Knowing the probable causes, parents are able to prevent this condition. If a child stops speaking, do not immediately despair and think that this is a sign of a serious illness. Your task is to figure it all out, to think about what preceded this state. If necessary, seek advice from a pediatrician or psychologist, neurologist. Sometimes it is better to be safe than to waste time and not start specific treatment in time.
Severe stress
The death of a beloved relative, the departure of one of the parents, an accident, a natural disaster, a constant nervous situation in the family, severe fear - all this can lead not only to the disappearance of speech, but also to the fact that the child can withdraw into himself for a long time.
Solution: If the silence continues for more than several hours, then you need to contact a child psychologist as soon as possible, since there is a high risk of developing severe stuttering. A specialist will help the child cope with severe emotional shock and get out of the situation with minimal consequences for his development. Follow all the recommendations strictly, and soon everything will be sorted out.
Possible reasons for delayed speech appearance per year
If the baby is completely healthy, there is no history of neurological diseases, but speech has not appeared at one year, most likely the reason for the delay is in an improperly organized speech environment.
What is meant by this term? It would seem that modern children are surrounded by a real stream of speech: TV, radio, cartoons, audio books and educational games for the youngest children. And parents talk a lot with their children.
The fact is that young children are not able to isolate individual words from a stream of speech. If no special purposeful work is carried out, this flow for a child sounds approximately the same as the sound of a waterfall sounds for us.
Today, speech games (Magpie-Crow, Ladushki), nursery rhymes, pestushki, songs, sayings, previously known in every family, have disappeared from everyday life. These unique simulators gently introduced the baby into the world of native speech. They were adapted to the needs of a child up to one year old, contained onomatopoeia, and were understandable to children.
Another factor in the “nutrient” environment for the development of children’s speech is communication with the mother. A silent mother or a mother who talks on the phone more often than with her own baby will not be able to replace the value of communication, which forms the speech structures of the brain, with the best educational games.
“Mowgli’s children”, “hospitalism” - all these terms denote a delay in the appearance of speech in healthy children who are deprived of the opportunity to communicate with loved ones due to their absence.
Overprotection or indifference on the part of parents
If parents go too far in matters of upbringing, show intolerance or misunderstanding, then the child instinctively tries to avoid any communication with them. With strangers and peers on the playground or in kindergarten, he often continues to behave as usual.
Solution: In this case, the help of a psychologist is needed, and it is advisable that both parents and the child come to the session. Mom and dad should reconsider their behavior and attitude towards the baby. Most likely, the reason is really too high demands or, conversely, complete disregard for the interests of the son or daughter. Excessive guardianship does not allow the child to express his opinion, and here silence should be considered as a sign of protest.
Can a child become silent due to vaccinations?
Many parents ask whether vaccinations can really lead to a sharp setback in psycho-speech and speech development. In fact, modern science does not know of a single reliable study proving that vaccines cause such harm to a child’s development. The disappearance of speech can be caused by failure to comply with the conditions of vaccination: only a healthy child with a strong immune system and no neurological pathologies can be vaccinated. At risk are children who have experienced oxygen starvation during pregnancy and childbirth, have organic defects of the central nervous system and heart, severe diseases of the respiratory system, suffer from atopic dermatitis, as well as children who often suffer from colds. Before each vaccination, be sure to have your child thoroughly examined by a doctor you trust.
In any case, when a child suddenly becomes silent, it is better to play it safe and at least show him to a pediatrician in order to rule out serious pathologies and not waste time. Before your visit, analyze what could have caused the loss of speech; this will help the doctor quickly make the correct diagnosis and provide the necessary assistance.
Publication date: 10/17/2019. Last modified: 08/30/2020.
Between normality and pathology
No one needs to prove the importance of timely mastery of their native speech. This is a complex, multifaceted process directly related to various mental functions: attention, thinking, memory and speech. They expect the first words from a one-year-old baby, but he cannot even say “dad” and “mama”, he babbles in his own language and is not going to learn new words.
Alarmed parents begin to study family history, turn to doctors for advice and do their best to speed up the speech development of the baby.
A one-year-old child is able to pronounce from 3 to 12 words, but in their structure they are simple, very similar to babbling. Woof-woof, beep-bee, am-am, lalya, give, dad, mom, baba, kitty, na, bang or whoop - this is the approximate vocabulary of children per year.
Each baby is individual - some develop their first word at 8–9 months, and others at 1 year 3 months, and all these are variations of the norm.
Before the appearance of the first word, the speech of a one-year-old child went through a complex path of development. The laws of the formation of children's speech do not change over time. Today, like 100–200 years ago, not a single baby begins to speak in words and sentences until he has gone through all the stages of speech development. These stages are associated with the development of the brain, articulation apparatus and hearing.
No early development method can change the laws of nature, according to which the organs of pronunciation (articulation), hearing and the central nervous system of a person develop.
If you are concerned that your baby speaks poorly, check out the main stages of pre-language development in children under one year of age:
- 1–2 months – the appearance of intonations of pleasure and displeasure in the cry;
- 1.5–3 months – humming or hooting, when children repeat after adults vowels with the sound [g] or pronounce them independently, carefully listening to the sounds they pronounce (agu);
- 4–5 months – babbling, pronunciation of similar words consisting of several identical syllables (ma-ma-ma, but this does not yet mean the word mom);
- 8–9 months – appearance of onomatopoeia (pee-pee, woof-woof) and babbling words (kuka, tata, nanny);
- 11 months – the child uses approximately ten babbling words in the correct context, correlating their pronunciation with the situation (mom, dad, dai, bibi, etc.).
What is considered pathology? It is still too early to make predictions about speech development at one year old, however, you should start to worry if a one-year-old baby does not understand simple verbal instructions that are not supported by gestures. For example, “Give me the ball”, “Show me where the car is”, etc. Lack of response to an adult's words may be a symptom of hearing impairment or its complete absence. In this case, speech stops at the humming stage, because the child has nothing to relate his own babble to.
If urgent measures are not taken at this stage, it will be very difficult to stimulate speech development in the future. It is important to promptly contact an otolaryngologist for a hearing test. Perhaps, in case of pathologies of the inner ear, the doctor will consider it necessary for the child to wear a hearing aid. In case of serious hearing deviations from the norm, this is the only opportunity to develop and maintain speech.
