Last updated on August 19, 2020
Question:
I’m 14 and recently my voice has been acting all squeaky and it’s been cracking and breaking a lot. I have a weird sensation in my throat like I want to cough or “ahem” as if I have phlegm in my throat. I cough but it doesn’t help. Is this my voice breaking?
Also, my voice hasn’t gotten deeper, it just squeaks over my normal voice. What’s up with that?
Answer:
The sensation of a “tickle” in your throat is not a typical symptom of your voice changing. The squeaks, cracks, and breaks, however, are very typical sign of your voice changing. It is possible that you might have caught a cold and it is making the changes in your voice more apparent because of its irritation to your throat.
A boy’s voice typically changes in stage 4 of development. The vocal cords get longer and the nasal cavities get larger which creates deeper tones. The difficulty is that the brain must relearn how to manage tightening and loosening the vocal cords to produce even sounding tones. You often lose control over the sound, especially when you are nervous or excited and are not focusing on how you sound.
Though you might not hear your voice becoming deeper, I would guess that if you heard a recording of yourself from last year you would notice a difference. The voice doesn’t get deeper all at once. It becomes deeper gradually. It generally takes about a year to a year and a half for the voice to completely change.