Ear Wax Plugs and Speech Problems

Input from a Speech Pathologist-If your ears are occluded by wax, you aren't able to hear the speaker in order to learn how to produce speech sounds. We have all heard deaf speech. It is sometimes difficult for the listen to determine what is being said. Speech intelligibility is impaired due the inability to hear (modeled speech). I think once you get the ear wax problem straightened out, your son will begin to produce more words and with better articulation.

A good friend of mine had the same problem with her son. He was almost two and his speech didn't seem to be on track for his age and what he did say was very garbled and difficult to understand. Also, he didn't seem to understand what was being said to him very well. My friend became concerned, so she took him to a specialist and found the ear wax problem. After they flushed him out, his language skills just took off! It took a little more time and patience to catch him up at this point, but now he speaks and responds just like a normal four year old boy. Your child is much younger, so I'm sure he will be right on track in no time. You may not even need the speech therapy, because more than likely he doesn't have an actual learning disability at all. Think about it this way: Go put earplugs in both of your ears, then go talk to someone. Inevitably, your speech will be altered in some way (too loud/soft, wrong pitch, etc) and you will probably have a hard time understanding the other person. This is obviously not because you have a speech problem...you just can't hear!

Best of luck to you!

My almost 6 year old just had a fly size chunk of wax removed from one ear and said she could hear a lot better - that my voice was higher. So, now that they can see the ear drum, have them check for fluid and have a hearing test - to see if he is hearing correctly now. It is painless and will remove those variables.
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I don't have an answer yet, but I am going through a similar situation with my son. He has been screened for a speech delay, and soon he will be officially evaluated. I am also getting his hearing checked. The weekend after the screener said my son wasn't responding to some of her requests, huge amounts of earwax came out of his ears. It will be interesting to see if his speech problems improve.

Dear Beata,

I did not have this specific situation, but from 1 to about 2 and a half, my son's speech was quite garbled and unclear, even for his age. He also had recurrent ear infections. At that point, I consulted with a naturopathic physician about a problem with his digestion, and she told that milk protein intolerances cause chronic congestion in young children, including in the ear canal. I got my son off ALL dairy, including in baked goods, prepared foods, etc., and it was like bam -- his speech just took off. He literally learned 50 new words in a week. Today, at 3.5, he has such a big vocabulary that we've had people in stores, etc., stop what they're doing and stare in amazement, I swear.

So, to me, an earwax buildup sounds like a red flag for a milk protein (or possibly another dietary) intolerance. You might try getting your son off all dairy (and this means reading every ingredient label). I also really recommend consulting with a naturopath or a holistic nutritionist -- the standard battery of allergy tests won't catch this.

Best wishes,

Mira

My daughter had tons of ear infections. When we went to the ENT we tried a few things with her and finally when she was tested and there was some low level hearing loss we decided to get her tubes right away. Once she got the tubes the hearing was fine. The doctor told us that even though she didn't have much wax, her ears never drained properly with an infection and anything like that in the ears can cause temporary hearing loss.
Hope everything turns out fine. You might want to see if it is a continuing thing and make an appt with an ENT if so!

And Mira, you are so right!!! A lot of people have no idea that this is the case. My daughter had GERD and was moved over to soy products and there was a huge difference in her ear infections too. Milk protein is also said to thicken mucus, not produce more but thicken it, making ear infections worse.