Any Other Recovering Selective Mutes?

[watundah]

I was a selective mute until I entered seventh grade. It was terrible. Putting up with an abusive/neglectful home and then being shut down and the freak at school meant no safe place. It morphed into social anxiety as an adult which I have managed to overcome 85% of the time.

However, there are times when the mute resurfaces. In certain meetings at work I used to sit and say nothing week after month, specifically those with the COO and other leaders. Boy, did that look bad. Now I no longer work so that stressor is gone.

One place the mute still appears and that is in therapy. The inner child will respond with short answers and my mind simply blanks as I shut down. I never received treatment for this disorder and am stuck doing it now. It is an anxious response and an effort to hide. So grateful for a kind therapist with limitless patience as it makes me frustrated and depressed when I spend an hour responding to questions with short responses and stammer and pause as I try to piece sentences together.

I would love to hear from other recovering SMs and maybe some insight about how they deal with this in therapy.

Thanks!

 

[Pencil]

This is very interesting. On a scale from 1- 10 I would rate 1 ... I think. I am becoming increasingly aware of my 'habit' of staring and not responding. I look like an idiot, I know, but, even though I register and know exactly what response is called for, nothing happens. I've never thought of putting a label on it, but i know it is when the 4yo is 'active' I go into zombie mode. One thing i discovered in the last couple of years is that the 4yo doesn't speak. So it figures.

 

[watundah]

Not to be confused with dissociation, (blanking out) it is specifically linked to voice. Do you know if you were mute at 4?

 

[Pencil]

No I wasn't mute at 4 or at any other age for an extended period of time. But I don't think what I'm referring to is dissociation. It is an inability to speak.

 

[ShodokanJenn]

I'm not mute, nor have I ever been. But my best friend growing up was. She stopped talking in kindergarten. I met her in fourth grade, and we quickly became inseparable. As I've said to people before, I was her voice and she was my wings. After we graduated high school, she went away to college. The change was enough to enable her to start talking. People who meet her now would never know she had that problem as a child.

 

[watundah]

Yes same here. I'm sorry she suffered for so long. It's a heavy burden.

 

[cat-lady]

I became selectively mute around 10 following some abuse. I have gone through a lot of symptoms over the years. While I eventually outgrew it for the most part I also still tend to be very quiet usually, especially when stressed or anxious. I also have that habit of staring and not responding especially when I'm overwhelmed. It's difficult socially because often people take it the wrong way.

 

[watundah]

@cat-lady How long were you mute? Did you talk in school? I hate that I am still dealing with this. My T tells me to quit pressuring myself to talk but really, what's the point then?

Did you know Maya Angelo's was an SM for many years?

I suppose that sm combined with being a highly sensitive person and trauma survivor has made me incredibly attuned to my surroundings!

 

[Tinyflame]

I'm not sure if the inability comes from the belief that there is no point to talk, or because of consequences from others to talk, or feeling no one wants to hear it, or there's no help in talking, or it's not heard, or because of denial, or fear, or not being worthy to, or any combination of all the above.

 

[watundah]

Selective mutism is actually an anxiety disorder, a freezer response based upon fear. My IC didn't want to be looked at and wanted to hide.

 

[cat-lady]

@cat-lady How long were you mute? Did you talk in school? I hate that I am still d...

I did talk in school but not frequently. Basically I would talk whenever not talking would put more attention on me than talking. I did not like attention because it made me uncomfortable. I wouldn't say there was a specific time that it totally stopped all of a sudden but I guess the closest thing to that was when I switched schools to go from junior high to high school. I didn't know anyone and I had to reach out to make friends. Also, the school I was in before had assisted in silencing me when I tried to speak out (a Catholic school in Chicago in the 80's and 90's).

I did not know that Maya Angelo was SM for many years. That makes me want to go read some of her stuff over again now knowing that.

 

[cat-lady]

Selective mutism is actually an anxiety disorder, a freezer response based upon fear. My IC didn't wan...

Same here. I wanted to be invisible.