Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums General Discussion Five year old son making constant noises

For the last couple of weeks, my DS5 has been making constant motor/machine/car noises. It is driving me insane. He is an extremely verbal child with multiple over-excitabilities and usually spends all his time talking but now he has moved on to making noises. I'm exhausted by it and everybody in our family has repeatedly asked him to stop. Today we had a play date with a preschool friend (the only kid in his class who ever asks him) and my son spent much of the time making noises while they were playing. It wasn't part of the play. Rather, the other boy would ask my son questions and my son just stared straight ahead and made noises and didn't respond. Afterwards I talked to him about the fact that the noises are annoying, that it isn't fun for the children who are trying to play with him and that it could make other children avoid him. He got really sad and I had to drop him off at school before we could discuss it more and now I feel awful. Did I do the right thing? Have your children had a phase like this? How did you respond? I feel like I had to say something because even his dad and I, who adore him, can't stand the noises and I imagine it only serves to further isolate him in the classroom.

I'm especially worried because my son has some problems with social skills and I feel like he doesn't really have any friends at preschool. He has been in a social skills playgroup for almost a year and has shown huge improvement but he still doesn't get invited to play dates with his classmates and when I'm in the classroom I can see that he is interested in other kids and plays with them but he isn't really part of the group. He sees a psychologist for the play group and she has evaluated him and observed him at school and does not believe he has ASD (she recommended against a full evaluation). She said he doesn't have any peers in his classroom and that she believes any social difficulties will mostly disappear if he can find a class with some peers. She recommended we send him to a local gifted school. The playgroup has a couple of kids who are also gifted and into science and math and my son connects with them very well so I do believe her. We are waiting to hear back from the school next week. Maybe that's causing me to fret more.

I'm sorry; this is a bit rambling. I'm just having a hard morning and feeling so worried that if we don't get into the gifted school that my son will experience years of feeling alone. Does anybody have advice or some perspective to share? I don't feel like I can discuss this with most of my friends because their kids' issues are so different than ours.

Hi Lepa,

Don't apologize for rambling. It's so hard to feel isolated and unable to talk to anybody to sort out what to do. I think many of us have been in your shoes in one way or another - I know I have.

Five was a very hard year for DS7. In fact, 3.5 to 6 was just a long, hard slog for us all. He also has lots of excitabilities and had a very hard time getting out of his head and into social interaction in anything remotely approaching a typical way. We also had him assessed (formally - twice - because we were desperate for answers) and were told "no" on ASD and ADHD (but yes on PG and dyslexic/dysgraphic). There were just things going on his mind that were way, way out of the box.

Things are better for him these days, and he has a few good friends at school. For us - this wasn't really the result of any specific therapy or action, because the things we tried didn't seem to help or fit. Somehow, his brain just seems to be pulling together in a way that makes it easier for him to relate to and enjoy others. A wise mom of another PG kid told me this happened for her child, and I clung to that during those hard years.

Now I'm rambling! But what I mean is - your kid is miles ahead having parents who care and work for him. I hope life gets easier (quieter!) for him sooner rather than later. But with you in his corner, I'm betting he's going to come out well. Meantime, well, at least none of us is stuck thinking we're alone!

Sue

Sue,

Thanks so much for your kind message. It really did give me the kind of perspective I was looking for and has helped me to feel much better. Everything I have read leads me to expect that this is a particularly difficult age for many gifted kids but sometimes it's difficult to remember that and I just worry about him.

Portia-

I hadn't thought about it from that perspective. I think my son might find that explanation helpful, too.

How did you find out about your son's visual processing issues? My son's most recent eye exam didn't show any problems with tracking or vision but I understand that sometimes ophthalmologists don't detect problems that may respond to vision therapy. I'm curious about what prompted you to get your son checked.

Thank you.