When you really need to use the telephone?

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hi all,
When you really need to use the telephone?
what do you do to cope and get done what you need to do on the phone?
sometimes i get really comfussed when on the phone.

what are your copeing strategies?

thanks cazzie

I write down and/or rehearse what I'm going to say to the person.

I just do it if it's unavoidable. It's usually not so bad. I make sure to be kind to the people I speak to, and that usually gets us through with a minimum of problems.

I almost always have to smoke a cigarette to make a phone call. Even if its to someone I know well. I can stress for days about having to phone someone. Sometimes I think I deal better with someone in person than on the phone.

Ive never had an issue with the phone if it was someone i know. if work calls, or a family member then its no big deal they know my personality.

the trouble comes when i have to call someone i dont know, like a computer shop or bike shop, i usually fumble my way through the call, in if i do have to go to the place, i make no mention of having called,

im ashamed, but i actually had my mother make an eye appointment for me, the office visit was fine, i used pre-learned small talk, and managed not to look like an ass, but trying to make the appointment would have been difficult.

I write down what I want to say, rehearse it, 10 times and than I make the call. Sometimes there's a bimbo on the other side, who doesn't understand anybody else's accent, but their own, but when that happens, I tell the woman, that I need her to hear, what I have to say.

This sounds familiar. I hate making phone calls. I get my wife to make the calls for me, when I can. She thinks it's funny that I hate to make these calls. There are even some calls that I have to initiate, say where I'm the primary credit card holder, and I then tell the person on the end of the line that I'm transferring them over to my wife. At work, I have to make the odd call to someone at another company, and I hate it. I write down everything before hand, and sometimes I even phone at quiting time or first thing in the morning so that I purposely get to talk to an answering machine. I don't know why these calls make me uneasy, they just do.

Wow I never knew that anyone was like me in this respect. I can hold a phone conversation okay it's just so awkward I'd rather beg a girlfriend or parent to make the call for me. I don't really have any way to cope aside from pace and exhale deep as soon as I get off it.

i talk only when something interest me.

i never ring anyone but clients.
my friends ring me, and it is not too bad because all i have to do is talk to the plastic mouthpiece that is blind.

they can not see the look on my face, so they presume i am listening even if i am reading stuff on my screen and saying "uh huh.....really?....mmmmmm".

i can talk on the phone better than i can talk to people in reality because i just have to say "yep.....oh yes...." and they continue talking even though i have no idea what they are saying because i am paying attention to something else.


i once thought that it would be good if they made a phone that had only a mouthpiece and no earpiece. then i would ring people and announce what i have to say and hang up, and they would accept that they had no chance to respond because i did not have a phone with an earpiece.

Well I just got off the phone making an appointment ironically enough, for neurological testing my psychiatrist asked me to go to for aspergers. And yea, that was a completely awkward conversation where I didn't know where to speak and interrupted so many times I felt like a total ass. I avoid having to talk to people on the phone and when I have to I practice what I'm going to say in the conversation -- sort of how I do when I speak to people irl for an appointment.

I try to make others make my appointments and deal with most of my phone calls. I feel like a little kid doing so, but it makes me really uncomfortable.

I would love to successfully script a phone conversation, but I can't seem to do it. I frequently go over and over what I'm going to say before calling, and then when the conversation takes a turn I hadn't thought of, I'm stopped in my tracks, have to think frantically to get out of the pause, and then it ends up being worse than if I had just picked up the phone without a script in my head. The only way I know how to cope with using the phone is to be as calm as possible, and not to rely on anything I have memorized.

I use text messege. If I can't use that then I keep it as brief as possible. But all in all I do EXACTLY what you do.

I love that idea. Just blurt out whatever you have to say and f**k off.

I personally would rather stick a knife through my head than to answer a phone. Being analytical-minded, I like to find reasons for, and explain feelings. I can't figure this one out; it's just that way. I'll write eMails, send texts, or even send out a carrier pigeon with a handwritten note before I'd choose Alexander G. Bell's "instrument of terror" as a means to communicate.

Charles

I don't cope very well when I have to use the phone. I have been brought to tears over recorded messages because I don't process verbal communication fast enough.