If your family is anything like that of most families today (including my own), there is a lot more to think about and navigate when it comes to parenting during these times. There is so much going on in our world that has led to increased stress and anxiety in both parents and in our children. While we may feel that young children are resilient to the stress of these times with not understanding the magnitude of what is happening, many are not going to school or daycare as they were before and are learning how to navigate online learning and being away from peers. This can be a stressful time for them as well. These stresses may be seen in changes in their speech and language skills and use. Below are a few examples of things to watch for with your child’s speech and language and when would be a good time to reach out for more information or guidance.
Changes in fluency:
Fluency, or stuttering, is tied together with anxiety and stress. Everyone has disfluencies when they talk, but they are often increased when we are stressed or anxious about things. Think about when you have to give a speech in front of an audience, you have practiced that speech many times, yet you may fumble over your words when you get up to tell them. This happens with kids as well. When they are stressed about getting and keeping your attention, with a sudden change in environment (this is currently happening everywhere), or when they are excited about telling you something they are proud of, we see children struggle more with the fluency. It can often be tied to focusing more on the message they want to give you and not on the delivery itself. If you have seen an increase in disfluencies with your child (I have with my own child), we are typically more concerned with more “red flag” disfluencies. These include: shows frustration or struggles when speaking, exhibits grimaces, bodily tension, and considerable effort when attempting to speak, avoids stuttering by changing words and using extra sounds to get started, stutters on more than 10% of their speech, stutters for 6 months or longer, or begins to stutter or continues to stutter after the age of 5 years.
Changes in language:
Changes in language (both receptive and expressive) can be seen during times of stress and anxiety. Language is such a vast topic that it can look very different with each child. It can look like not being able to follow the directions they could have before, not talking as much with others, having increased difficulty with talking to others outside of the family, and the list goes on. With language, the biggest red flag is huge regressions in an area that is consistent across activities and people and doesn’t seem to resolve as the stress decreases.
Changes in eating:
This is often a hard topic to talk about for families when it comes to times of stress, but eating is an area where children will try to take back some of the control they may feel they have lost with the times. If you notice that your child has decreased overall amount of food they are eating greatly, are refusing to eat at all, have difficulty with choking or gagging, or are limiting the types of foods they are eating (when they used to eat a good variety) to less than 25 foods, that would be a time to reach out for more information and guidance on next steps. This doesn’t mean it is not stress related and could resolve with time as the stress reduces, but with food and nutrition (especially with our children), it is good to get ahead of it!
As I said before, these are stressful times and we are sure to see some areas give with our children and their speech and language skills, but there are red flags that we want to watch more closely. If you have any questions or concerns that have come up during these times, please to not hesitate to reach out to any of us here at Family Chatterbox and we will be happy to talk with you through them and make next steps if need be! We hope you are all safe and well and we are excited to finally be able to get back into your homes!
~Amber