I think Sam needs to go to the doctor. There is something wrong with his voice. Sam's voice is really loud. And I don't mean just a little loud. I mean REALLY LOUD. When Sam talks, glasses in the cabinet shatter. His voice resonates through your body and pierces your eardrums even when he is just asking for a glass of milk.
MOMMY! I NEED SOME MILK PLEASE MOMMY! CAN I HAVE SOME MILK PLEASE? MOMMY! PLEASE CAN I HAVE SOME CHOCOLATE MILK? MOOMMMYY! MILK PLEASE MOMMY!
He's not yelling. We don't even want to talk about the yelling. Actual yelling will make your eyes pop out like Arnold in Total Recall. This is just his normal voice. The other day we were at Target buying a birthday gift for a party we were headed to. This is what it sounded like as we wandered through the toy aisles:
I WANT THAT! I WANT THAT SPIDER MAN THINGY! WHAT IS THAT? I WANT THAT! I WANT THAT THOMAS TRAIN! LOOK AT THAT THOMAS TRAIN! I WANT ALL THOSE THOMAS TRAINS! GASP! GEOTRAX! I WANT THAT GEOTRAX TRAIN! THAT YELLOW ONE! CAN I HAVE THAT YELLOW ONE? CAN I PUT THAT ON MY BIRTHDAY LIST? CAN I? PLEASE MOMMY?
He wasn't whining or crying for anything. He was just pointing out all the cool things that he saw and he wanted everything. We put everything on his imaginary birthday list and we were both fine with that. The wanting was not a problem. It was just that he wanted everything REALLY LOUDLY.
I wanted nothing so much as a little sound proof booth to put him in. Then I could push him around in his little pope-mobile cart and no one would have to listen to the deafening roar. I felt horrible for the other shoppers. They were all pointing and staring at that woman with the child with the Freakishly Loud Voiceâ„¢. I tried to get him to use his "quiet voice", but, frankly, he doesn't own one.
Aside from the fact that his voice is louder than a jet doing a flyby over your house is the fact that he never. shuts. up. Ever. He will continue repeating what he is saying until you acknowledge his point (see "milk" above) and then he will move on to the next topic. If you've ever called my house on the telephone, you know what I'm talking about. My dad says he "doesn't have the luxury of an unexpressed thought." I say he can drain the energy from a full grown adult in 5 minutes flat with sheer loudness and non-stop talking.
So if you're at Target and you hear what sounds like a small child with a bullhorn, look for us. Sam will be the one with two volume levels on his voice: LOUD and BLEEDING EARDRUMS and I'll be the one with the industrial strength earplugs, shopping blissfully in silence.