Son throws a fit whenever he hears his mom's voice

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TheSperg
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23 Oct 2014, 9:05 am

Four year old, mostly non-verbal except to requested wanted things like toys or food.

Whenever my wife(his mom) talks even if not to him he starts getting angry, going UH UH UH or kicking or slamming his hand on a wall or floor. This morning he got both of us angry because my wife was softly talking to me telling me she thinks she has a infected tooth and needs to go to the dentist, we were talking about this and he was across the room and he starts yelling UH UH UH like a cry almost and kicking. If she keeps talking and ignores him it is like a meltdown ramping up, the second she stops talking or changes her voice higher or lower he stops.

She has actually had discussions with me in a mickey mouse voice to avoid this, it has on occasion caused both of us to yell at him to stop when it is something important or an emergency and we are trying to talk and he gets so loud we can't even hear each other. I guess you can see how annoying that would be.

I don't know why or how this started, it is only his mom he responds to this way. She can read the phone book not facing him in a soft neutral voice and he still goes into a progressive meltdown.

Anyone have an idea?



ASDMommyASDKid
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23 Oct 2014, 9:11 am

Is it a sensory issue with higher-pitched voices/sounds? There may be something about her voice, if not pitch, that he finds upsetting from a sensory perspective?



TheSperg
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23 Oct 2014, 10:08 am

ASDMommyASDKid wrote:
Is it a sensory issue with higher-pitched voices/sounds? There may be something about her voice, if not pitch, that he finds upsetting from a sensory perspective?


I don't know that could be i though, if she pitches her voice lower or higher he doesn't throw a fit. So if she talks lower or higher pitch everything is ok, but her normal speaking voice he throws a fit. But for important stuff this starts to feel laughable and makes you angry.

I've even become angry and yelled at him because someone is trying to tell you they need to go today or tomorrow at the least to the dentist and our son is in the corner kicking and screaming UH UH UH until we can't even hear each other. Either we let him out to play in the yard or only talk when he is dead asleep which is pretty hard.



RightGalaxy
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23 Oct 2014, 11:19 am

Maybe he wants his mom to talk to him. Even though he's non-verbal and may not even know what's she talking about, he wants her to talk to him much, much more. Try something out: have her tell you about her tooth and then have him sit down and have your wife tell him directly the same thing she said to you. And then again, BUT just to him and not to you the second time around. Who knows? Maybe this is his way of saying he wants "in" on the conversation. Look at it this way, it's not his fault or his decision to be non-verbal - he simply can't be verbal. That's doesn't mean he doesn't want to be verbal. He's may be trying to communicate his interests and opinions besides his basic needs like food and potty. He probably wants to tell you about himself but he can't. It's frustrating. Can you see his point? Maybe what he's trying to tell his mom is,"Teach me how to talk." When she varies pitch, he's sees that as something different. He's just listening. My son who is now 15 used to break his toys because of the frustration of not knowing what to do with them. I had to teach him how to play with his toys. He wasn't able to use his imagination when it came to play. I had to provide specific scenarios which he would repeat over and over again. He memorized how to play and then he played. But a lack of spontaneous play caused him to be unable to hold friends. Now at 15, he's a very different kid than when he was 5. Now, he's what you may consider, normal?? He had a lot of problems when he was little. By the way, "The Sperg" is a fun user name. It made me chuckle. I think my user name sounds a bit boring. I had it for a long time though.



Last edited by RightGalaxy on 23 Oct 2014, 11:46 am, edited 2 times in total.

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23 Oct 2014, 11:40 am

I like RightGalaxy's reply, that is definately something to try.

I wanted to say it is possible that the pitch or note of her regular voice hurts his ears. My eardrums vibrate painfully, but only for certain notes/types of sounds. When it happens, I just want it to STOP. I'd do anything. It hurts.



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23 Oct 2014, 10:09 pm

TheSperg wrote:
ASDMommyASDKid wrote:
Is it a sensory issue with higher-pitched voices/sounds? There may be something about her voice, if not pitch, that he finds upsetting from a sensory perspective?


I don't know that could be i though, if she pitches her voice lower or higher he doesn't throw a fit. So if she talks lower or higher pitch everything is ok, but her normal speaking voice he throws a fit. But for important stuff this starts to feel laughable and makes you angry.

I've even become angry and yelled at him because someone is trying to tell you they need to go today or tomorrow at the least to the dentist and our son is in the corner kicking and screaming UH UH UH until we can't even hear each other. Either we let him out to play in the yard or only talk when he is dead asleep which is pretty hard.


If it is a sensory issue it doesn't seem fair to get angry at him. He's a 4-year-old kid who's in pain.


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TheSperg
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24 Oct 2014, 1:27 am

Who_Am_I wrote:

If it is a sensory issue it doesn't seem fair to get angry at him. He's a 4-year-old kid who's in pain.


Oh I agree with you, which is why I posted because I'm trying to find a solution and I don't know how much longer this issue can be ignored or worked around. To be clear I don't blame my son, or remained angry at him or punished him for it or anything, it was just that in the moment of an important conversation where I was going to have to rework my whole day and needed to think and process he was making noise loud enough I couldn't hear and wouldn't stop. Should I have become angry and yelled at him to stop? Probably no but hey I'm human.

I don't know if it is a sensory issue because it is very recent, and it doesn't happen all the time. I can talk to my wife as much as I want she can't reply in her normal voice, and he doesn't do this when she is talking to him unless she is like telling him to stay in bed because it way past his bedtime, he also does this when I tell him something he doesn't want to do like stay in bed etc.

I am suspecting he thinks she is talking to him, when she is really talking to me and even though her tone of voice isn't stern. What I mean is I think he thinks she is scolding him, even though she isn't.



ASDMommyASDKid
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24 Oct 2014, 8:22 am

TheSperg wrote:
Who_Am_I wrote:



I am suspecting he thinks she is talking to him, when she is really talking to me and even though her tone of voice isn't stern. What I mean is I think he thinks she is scolding him, even though she isn't.



This is very possible. My son hates being told something more than once, (or something that he already knows) and sometimes I will tell my husband something and my son will tell yell out, "I know, I know!"

I try to tell him that I am not always speaking to him, but he really does not get that everything is not intended for him. I also tell him that sometimes he just has to put up with me repeating things he knows, reminding him of things, etc. but that is a different topic.



setai
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24 Oct 2014, 11:56 am

Sperg

First of all I just want to say I am so sorry. That has to be hard on you and esp your wife. Even if I knew it wasn't personal it would hurt to hear your child scream at the sound of your voice. Also it would be insanely frustrating to not be able to have a conversation with your wife.

I don't have a solution but an observation. When we have had strange new issues pop up like this w/ our son it tends to be a combo. Recently our son became extremely upset which is extremely unlike him, about a little boy in school taking off his shoes. He was crying at school, talking about it at home and putting himself in time out for no reason. He over and over again was tell us the story and say " ____ is mad/sad" and we would have to reassure him his friend was ok and happy. He has issue with other people taking off there shoes, but we have been working on it for over a year and it has gotten much better. The problem was the little boy was have serious behavior issue and taking off his shoes. Being in an HFA pre k, kids have melt downs all the time and they don't phase my guy. Kids take off their shoes, he doesn't like it, but has learned to go tell the teacher and for the most part deal with. However his friend spending hours crying and kicking while his shoes were off was too much for him. If his shoes are off it upsets him and he was trying to help his friend by putting his shoes back on and getting the teacher's to help put his shoes on. He couldn't get distracted because the his friend was melting down. Also the rest of the class and the teachers even were getting frazzled. It was just more than my poor little 4yrs newly formed coping mechanisms could handle. On the bright side he came home that day telling us about what happened at school that day, a first. More importantly his teacher came up with a brilliant plan. She made a special cubby for the little boy's shoes. She had him take off his shoes when he was happy and showed my little guy that his friend was happy with his shoes in the shoe cubby. Two weeks later we still occasionally hear about the shoes in the cubby and the little boy being happy, but it is almost resolved.

So after my long story what I am trying to say, perhaps it a couple of things. Maybe there is some stressor that is making him not about to cope with the sensory issue of the tone of your wife's voice. He just can't cope. If you can do some research into all the factors, you can find your own shoe cubby solution.



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24 Oct 2014, 12:44 pm

The only note I will add is that sensory issues can "trip;" one day they seem fine, and practically the next they are the worst thing in the world. It is like a circuit board that suddenly got overloaded and now the switch is flipped. Never discount that something might be a sensory issue just because it never used to be a problem.

My son's sensory issues started to develop in the preschool years and got progressively worse through most of elementary school. Then they seemed to calm down for him. At the same time, the kid who was once drawn to chaos started to avoid it, and that was drawn to social situations could no longer handle them. Each one of these small things slowly "tripped" over time, not all at once, and it took me a while to realize what was happening. Your son will be changing a lot over the next decade, so keep eyes wide open, stay flexible, and assume nothing.

Yeah, easy as pie, right? Sorry, but that is the way it seems to be.

Good luck with figuring this one out. Once you have a better idea what the trigger is, I simply suggest honoring the need / avoiding the triggers until he seems ready to work on it; then you can ask him to nudge a little. But that may not be for years so, yeah, this is not going to be easy. Sorry and giant hugs to all of you.


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24 Oct 2014, 4:04 pm

He may be getting very frustrated trying to "hack" this verbal communication thing (and possibly getting close-- having it almost within reach would make the frustration level skyrocket). Talking to him directly more is certainly worth a shot.

I figure, though, that there's something about that pitch that is just excruciatingly painful. Which has to be horribly frustrating for you, your wife, and your kid.

I don't blame you for getting mad. I really don't. I mean, obviously it's not morally right-- he's FOUR and IT HURTS. But it is still very human. Even parents of autistic kids still have to be human. So you yell. You didn't smack him or call him every nasty name in the book, right?? OK-- you're batting 500!!

Because, you know, that's something that's going to have to be got over. And, even though it's not professional or pleasant or medically recognized, "Dammit, Quit That!!" is (in my very uneducated opinion anyway) a form of therapy.

Parents of special-needs kids should get to drop balls and get compassion too. With sprinkles on top.


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danothan24
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25 Oct 2014, 1:47 pm

I'm about 90% sure this is a sensory issue. I had similar issues when I was young, not with a parents speaking voice, but with my classmates singing in music class. Up through middle school I had a strict "no-singing" rule that my cousins and sisters HATED. I could handle their voices at talking levels, but when they started singing I would get a splitting headache and would throw a fit, screaming and crying...as you can imagine, this lead to some truly nightmarish car trips and family vacations. Same issue with my Dad whistling, and the "funny" noises he insisted on making all the time.

I completely understand your frustration...but try not to get too angry at the little guy. I wasn't diagnosed till later in life, and growing up everyone also got pissed at me when I would have my fits, to the point I was often punished for it. To this day there is a lot of bitterness between me and my family for their punishing me over things I couldn't control (amongst other factors), and I doubt we'll ever be terribly close. You're only human, and I'd be going crazy from this situation too. Just do bear in mind, how you handle this over the next couple years could have a drastic long-term impact on your relationship with your son.

Maybe invest in ear plugs and train him to use them when noises bother him?


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