word stock

i am semi nonverbal i think. i have a very low word stock.

like if i’m typing, depending on the headspace I can go on for a while, have a back-and-forth on discord for twenty or more messages in a row on a good day.

irl/spoken has less stock. i can talk a lot about my special interests specifically but not really as a back and forth and it has my natural speech pattern which is probably hard to follow. and when i infodump it tends to be about convoluted subject matter and jump place to place. but i haven’t actually infodumped irl like that to since uhhh november i think.

on most days i never speak more than a few sentences, usually just “okay, will do”, “I’ll get right on that”, “thank you”, and a couple short commentaries/jokes in passing about something on tv. i primarily communicate in the little sign my partner has learned (yes, no, cute, funny, i’m fine, look at this, i love you, you’re so gorgeous, are you thirsty, are you hungry, no problem, sorry, so-so).

as far as participating in conversations, on good days i can do shortish responses but my response time is pretty shit bc i take forever to process it and then I gotta gather and piece together my words properly and practice it in my head to check first. so there’ll be this awkward lag. and then on worse days i struggle to put out trisyllabic responses. which sucks because sometimes you know that the response you can give will be misconstrued but so will silence and you just can’t give them anything better.

and that’s not even talking about anything serious.  when somebody tries to have a serious conversation about me out loud, instead of messaging me, i always just nod along in agreement and throw out a couple “sorry”s and “thank you”s because whenever i try to articulate that sort of shit all that comes out is a couple stunted syllables and then echolalia noises, and then the pressure to speak more clearly ends up in a meltdown in front of them. and god i hate going full retard with an audience.

then, much worse than talking irl, there is the phone. being on call. i have tried. just last june i worked up the nerve and picked up a phone call. it lasted less than a couple minutes, i didn’t process any of the words, i couldn’t respond, and the resulting meltdown was three days of awful, but hey at least i was able to get that far.

in order to schedule a doctor’s appointment for my physical bullshit i’d need to call. in order to schedule a therapy appointment i’d need to call, and the local guys only do phone appointments. to get back on my meds at the beginning of the pandemic i was supposed to call to switch pharmacies (the one i had been going to shut down). to get a replacement sim card for my water damaged one i’d need to call. to get any legitimate job in my area i’d need to call or answer a call. so i just. don’t do any of those things.