Selective Mutism.

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Does anyone else suffer with this?

If so, any advice? How do you deal with it?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Selective_mutism

Anxiety in social situations causes me most of my problems. My inability to properly articulate myself well (or at all in extreme circumstances) is a huge part of that. When it comes to the 'flight, fight or freeze' response I freeze-up severely - My anxiety rises, my mind goes blank, my body tenses and I can't speak. If I do manage to say something it comes out halting, (what I see) as barely intelligible and extremely basic.

This is extremely embarrassing for me. To look so gormless and stupid due to being incapable of something so basic as speech is just humiliating. What's even more painful is that when I'm with someone I'm comfortable around in a familiar environment, I'm more articulate and capable of conversation than many people my age.

Last edited by nothingunusual on 15 May 2009, 2:07 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Probably.

How I cope?
I force myself to talk and only talk when I have to.
I avoid going out and doing stuff by myself.
Prepare what I'm going to say in advance.
Prepare a polite script.

It's neither fun nor pleasant.
It's embarrassing and inconvenient.

A thread on elective mutism can be found here (from what I've read it amounts pretty much to the same thing):
http://www.wrongplanet.net/postt97474.html


I wish I had advice, but no-one's really noticed or helped me deal with it before!

Given my high ability in other areas, I've been able to mask this for a long time.

Until recently, I honestly thought that everyone felt extreme terror when interacting with people outside the house, but they had just learned how to cope better.

This isn't a joke any more: this is severely impinging on my life and prospects.
Because I was polite and did everything to the letter, no-one seems to either notice or care.

How do I deal with it?

I just deal with it =/

If it's something somewhat important that I need to say, I'll try my hardest to spit it out, but otherwise I try not to let it bother me.

It does get somewhat awkward when it's just me and one other person though. If it gets too awkward, I might pretend I'm interested in the scenery, or that I'm really tired, maybe I'll yawn and close my eyes for a bit

Sometimes if I meet new people, they'll say "You're quiet." and I'll just say "Yep."

I had a guy once, who had worked with kids, reply that "it's the quiet ones you have to watch out for" @_@

i tend to stay quiet unfortunately, better to be assumed a fool than to prove it.. if people ask specific questions they get long answers, but i find really quite hard to just talk entirely freely, like there has to be a point or i have something "important" to say.. & i often forget what i'm trying to say.. kinda like now i think. hmm erm yea no idea how to cope other than just "jump in at the deep end" perhaps take up public speaking, but that would scare me & possibly just cause me to freeze up..
but it COULD be great.. sorry for teh random

You sound exactly like me.
It's like a vicious cycle of anxiety. I feel incredibly anxious about social situations, which makes me stumble over my words, freeze, stutter and just generally sound unintelligent and inarticulate. This, in turn, causes me to be even more anxious and my mind to go yet more blank. Therefore I spiral into a loop of fear and self-hatred that stretches to infinity.

It's like there's a missing connection between my brain and my mouth. My written vocabulary is vastly more developed than my spoken vocabulary and I don't know how that can be.

In social situations I tense up so much I find it nearly impossible to swallow, which doesn't help with the anxiety at all. When I was much younger (3-4) I used to dribble continuously in social situations because of this. I also paralysed my left thumb because I would always squeeze my thumb into my fist to try to comfort myself. I had an operation to get it moving again but it still has rather minimal mobility.

Anyway, I haven't found any ways to deal with it yet, I just...put up with it as best I can.

Last edited by Hala on 15 May 2009, 2:44 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Kind of I start talking then all of a sudden stop. And when I spoke in front of a class in highschool one time I zoned out so much I spoke for 8 minutes instead of the limit of 5 and I didnt know what had happened.

Ahh, thanks for this. I'll take a look through it.



This is very true!



Me too. In my case I think this goes with anxiety and panic aswell.



I'm actually now a firm believer in the benefits of deep end jumping (too an extent ) or at least a good amount of heavy exposure. I used to be so avoidant and preferred to sit around just wishing things away and hoping things would sort themselves out.

Last edited by nothingunusual on 15 May 2009, 2:54 pm, edited 1 time in total.

cool i guess the deep end is not for everyone, but sometimes can make all the "shallow end" worries seem smaller & kinda "show" you that you can do it &do it good.. i play guitar & have played a few gigs.. i felt a huge confidence boost after my first performance & i think it helped a little with all aspects of social confidence.. i thought, "if i can do this, talking to people should be easy" &sometimes just that thought gets me through but not so much anymore..
if nothing else, (i'm sure there's more ) you are apparently very intelligent & are likely to have some good ideas, the kind "normal" folk aren't so likely to think of.. & these ideas need to be heard! you know?

^^ I am sorry for my late reply. My niece was diagnosed with selective mutism when she was very young (five years old or younger). ^^ She would be happily silent to certain individuals, including her father (who was seperated from my nieces mother, who is my happy sister) and most individuals she had not come across. My sister's friend is a happy speech therapist, and I believe my niece is now very confident with all humans (she is not present on the happy autistic spectrum I believe). I believe my sister's happy friend began using pictures and to start with small words first, however my niece is now happily ten years old and I find great difficulty in remembering. ^^ Alas, I too have difficulty in social situations and find difficulty in speaking to certain individuals. To help me, I attempt to not consider the happy individuals I am speaking to, yet what I am speaking of (for instance, if I require to write a solution upon the blackboard when my seminar groups is watching me). ^^ Sorry if I am of little help however.

Try writing notes and showing them to people you are with and then maybe adding the odd word or two when you feel more comfortable. Casual conversation is usually unhelpful but a shared interest where you can help each other out is a better situation, it has a point to it and makes it more important.

I was mute when I was a child and I couldn't even persuade myself to speak even when I was about to get into trouble one day. It is very difficult and quite distressing when you just cannot make yourself do it.

oh, definitely one of my main (and most uncomfortable) problems. i'm worst around young women. the more vapid and generic they are, the worse i am. also stoic, rural, conservative types. if i can tell a person is "different" or individualistic in any way, be they artist, hippie, punk, lefty, outcast, neurotic, goofball, hooker, minority, eccentric, i usually have no problem. but the more normal they are, the more i close down.

Thank you for bringing-up this topic. It revived a memory that I had forgotten long ago. I remembered three incidents from when I was four or five years old. In two of those instances I could not speak. It was very early in the morning and I had just awakened. I wanted to go and talk to my grandmother (my mother’s mother) but I had simply forgotten how to speak. I remember hitting my mouth several times but I simply could not remember what I had to do to make sounds come out. In another incident I was walking with my mother to my grandfather’s (my father’s father) and I forgot how to walk. I was walking but I was scraping the soles of my shoes because I could not remember how to take steps. It might be helpful to note that at that age, normally, I was very articulate and had been walking very well and that at the time I do not remember being under any stress. Thinking back on it, it was as if I had found myself on the wrong planet, no pun intended.

True enough, the type of person I'm around does have a big effect on how comfortable I am and how well I'm able to speak. I'm actually alot more comfortable with people who are down to earth with no pretenses, who say what they feel and mean what they say (and talk alot). People who might be called 'rough' or 'common' by some people, salt of the earth types who don't give a f**k.

Here's another thread on selective mutism topic.
It was called "being non-verbal" for anyone who's interested.
It explores the idea of "social shutdown".

http://www.wrongplanet.net/postt96312.html

Socialize with only one person at a time.
Public outings with multiple allies exacerbate this.

this. and then once that third person comes along, the convo usually gets hijacked and you have to "bow out". also notice how fast that person you were talking to turns away from you and to the other. this is how you can tell that other person never really wanted to talk to you in the first place.