Covering his ears... Advice needed please

Rosebean

About 10 days ago, DS caught a cold. Snotty nose mainly, with a wet cough. He also started covering his ears with his hands. I notice lately that it seems to be a behaviour that he does when he is whining about something. I honestly don't know if this has come as a result of the cold , or something more. He's really been making some breakthroughs on his verbal skill sets... He's putting words together now, remembering where things were (if I randomly ask where his hat is and I have no clue where I saw it last, he runs and gets it). Dr. Google has some pretty scary suggestions of Aspbergers and Autism when I write "toddler covers ears". I know it started with his cold, but it sure doesn't stop me from worrying that it means something more. We have a doctors appointment December 9th, but I wanted to reach out to you ladies. Am I being over worried? Or is this a legitimate concern?

BBS!

It's only a sign of autism spectrum disorder if there are other symptoms. I wouldn't worry about it! They do weird things at this age.

tamarar5

My ears feel weird right now from allergies. When I talk, my voice is echoing in my head (like stereo sound) and it's annoying. I wouldn't worry yet, I'd guess it's probably from the cold. It's possible while coughing, he popped his ear and it hurts our feels weird.

Poppy523

I agree with the PPs- it's only a symptom with other symptoms. By itself it's just a toddler being a toddler, maybe one with an ear infection.

Meggiemuggins

My DS does this too, but he hasn't had a cold.  He just started doing it out of the blue.  Now he does it just after we've caught him doing something naughty, like he's trying to block out the forthcoming scolding.  He's also doing it when we say "where are your/my ears?"  He used to just point to one ear, now he'll cover both.  I'm not worried; I'm chalking it up to his discovery that he has two ears that can covered at once, then things sound neat and muffled.