Is there such a thing as

[PrincessFiona]

a child who talks too much in a pathological sense?

Zoe is just really unbearable. This isn't something I have ever experienced before. It's hard for me to be patient. It never stops. She constantly talks, sings, or vocalizes in some way. This can include just making noise or making up words for the sake of hearing herself.

She also feels that she always has to be sitting on your lap or lying next to you with her feet crawling up your top or behind you with her mouth pressed to your ear.

She seems truly hurt and devastated by my increasingly impatient response.

[PrincessFiona]

Example. Zoe is eating a cookie. Bouncing up and down. Mmmmmh. Uh huh uh huh oh yaaah. Mom, why is it kiwi and strawberry?(singing now) morning when the staaaaar glows. Bop ba. Nuh nuh. (talking). Mom. Mom. Can I play the color game when you're done. ((singing) 7,8 end up straight.

Thud

[GreyhoundsRUs]

No advice, but boy am I tired from just reading about her

[PrincessFiona]

I wonder if it would be weird if I went to the pedi and said she is talking me to the point of tears...really, sometimes I literally freak out on her because I just can't cope with it not stopping. She even follows me from room to room. It isn't like she doesn't get enough attention.....

[Pollyanna]

I think it would be fine to ask the pediatrician. We have talkers as well and I completely understand needing a break. Our oldest had anxiety issues and you could always tell when she was anxious because the talking would really ramp up. She literally would not take a breath in between sentences. .

[DCJenn]

Absolutely give the pediatrician a call. My nephew is a talker- he's always getting in to trouble in school because he just is incapable of being quiet. My mom bought the book "My Mouth is a Volcano" about talking too much and he told her that his kindergarten teacher made him read it last year.

Jenn

[diggitydot]

Our DS is *precisely* how you just described Zoe. I've always just chalked up his constant noise to the low impulse control of his ADD.

He's now 8 so we talk with him about where his noises belong. Regular talking voice belongs inside the house or school, loud voice is outside, silly noises (he mimics sounds exactly like that guy off the old Police Academy movies) belong on the playground only.

It took a REALLY long time for him to have even the tiniest shred of self-control, and even that was hit or miss. It wasn't until after his diagnosis and a low dosage of non-stimulant meds before his impulsivity issues improved. And they improved DRAMATICALLY. Grades skyrocketed and noises dropped.

I'm in no way implying that Zoe may have any issues related to ADD; just that this was our experience with uncontrollable kidlet chatter.

I don't know. My little sister was that way, so much that my parents pulled her from school. They hardly knew how to deal with it after the first three quiet ones. She had some trouble years, but she's a real joy to the people around her now. I wonder if asking someone about it might have helped my parents get her through the low points a little better.

[Phoebe]

you have just described my 9 year old to a T!

[Meenah]

OMG!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! That was Caroline. I swear she came right out of the womb babbling / shrieking. When we went home the nurses wished me luck!!!!!

[HouseofWool]

Honestly? ADD is the first thing that popped into my head. I would talk to your ped. If it is (obviously I can't say) then you can get a handle on it before it impacts her abilities at school. If it isn't, they you at least rule it out.

I can't imagine being in her constant company. It is really hard to be with a chatterbox like that. I wish you luck with it! Or at least a good bottle of wine once she is in bed.

[TigerLily]

Maybe it's in the name, because I'm pretty sure that is exactly what I was like when I was a kid. My husband probably thinks I'm still like that sometimes, but that is because he hadn't met me as a child. I don't have any good advice, just that I turned out to be a fairly normal adult, and my mom doesn't have to lock herself in the bathroom anymore.

[mommax3]

Luke is like that.....and he probably has ADHD. He is also very smart and gets bored very quickly, which is probably true of Zoe as well. He would drive me NUTS when he was little and I was afraid his little brother wouldn't ever learn to talk because Luke never shut up! (My mom told me later that she had once had the same fears re: me and my younger sister, so I guess he came by it honestly!) Interestingly enough, he didn't babble or vocalize much as a baby, to the point that our pediatrician expressed concern....but once he could talk, he did nothing but! What worked: instituting quiet time....setting the timer and making it for longer and longer periods of time, with the promise of undivided attention from me once quiet time was up. I would also define and differentiate between purposeful noise (for communication) and foolish noise (verbal diarrhea!) and eventually would ask him to do the same: "is the noise you are making meaningful, or just noise?" and would ask him to stop if it was just noise. I also *sometimes* would make it about me and say that my ears were really tired, or that I was thinking really hard about something and needed quiet, but if he wanted to go in his room to make noise, it was okay. I was very direct and explained that the constant foolish noises are annoying to people and would cause people to avoid him. It didn't work to blow up at him, (although I did plenty of that!) because it truly hurt his feelings.....he didn't understand what was so bad about what he was doing until I explained it. Nathan (youngest) started going down the same path when he was about the same age, but it was much easier to deal with the second time around. Looking back now, I think of it as a phase rather than a huge issue because it happened with two of my kids at about the same age.

[PrincessFiona]

Sally, we worried about Zoe too when she was little but felt like she definitely grew out of the not-talking. Oh, how the pendulum hath swung to the other side. You guys have given me some good things to think about.

The only way I've been able to deal with it is to sometimes send her off to the computer to talk to it. She loves making videos of herself. Shockingly, today, I discovered that she has begun talking to herself and then giving a pause for an answer. Cute and sort of unnerving at the same time!http://s296.photobucket.com/albums/m...2-03at1651.mp4

[L.Jane]

I discovered that she has begun talking to herself and then giving a pause for an answer. Cute and sort of unnerving at the same time!http://s296.photobucket.com/albums/m...2-03at1651.mp4

Does she watch Dora? Dora asks questions and waits for you to answer just like that.

That was my sister exactly. The teachers had to talk to her often because she would be singing during a spelling test or quiz and she never even knew she was singing.