Verbal communication issues

[supermum_ms]

Hey there Guys and Dolls,

I do know i'm not the only one here that has difficulty with verbal and other communication issues, but word retrival, word substitution etc are more commonly discussed issues. I thought i'd get a verbal communication issues, whilst on top of other communicational issues conversation going, I know i'm not alone but it does kind of feel that way sometimes so for others like me that are experiencing this too, lets get this party started!

Lol for a talk-a-holic i'm basically cured, talking a lot aint so much of a problem anymore, getting words out of my mouth coherantly has become an over riding issue. Gone is the women who could stand (!!) before hundreds and on the odd occation thousands of people, confidently and coherantly talking, lol for hours at a time, day after day. Since my stutter/slurring started in 09, it just keeps (dare i say it) getting worse and worse. Up until a couple of months ago, i'd of said i'm on a sliding scale, my verbal abilities goes hand in hand with my levels of fatigue, thats physical fatigue from talking/chewing or activity but that was before.

Now, well its practically all the time, every sentence out of my mouth is interupted by my stutter/slurr somewhere, i simply never know when i'm going to get stuck, until i'm stuck. Words i want to say are becoming more garbled through voul changes or elongated eg sucessfully = sucesssssssessfffffffuleeey. Its already auckward enough with loosing words, substituting words etc but when your struggling, and yeah it does become a struggle more than i'd like to admit, just getting a word out. You do talk less and less, for a start its exhausting, not only physically but mentally too. Its like playing mental chess, you've got to have a healthy theasorus in your kit bag, and um well my once gifted brain is just well and truely fried.

So on top of all the other word issues in each sentence i utter, i'm having to pause a lot, thinking ok that word is not ever coming out right, whats another word for xx or I just have to leave a gap and continuing on, make sence much not! lol Sometimes its so funny in its stupidity, that i can't help cracking up, from the stunned look of confusion the other person is wearing. lol i can't tell you the number of times my son has actually gone to take his clothes out of the disssshshsh (pause) waaaasher, before he's worked it out. lol the other day dh laughed when he heard someone talking about being distracted and then suddenly the guys head spun around as he yelled squirel, and then he just continued on with what he was saying, dh hadn't seen that ADD jest before. so later that night whilst i was talking i went to yell squirel but instead yelled 'horse' well we were both doubled over laughing our heads off. ROFL!!

This is the hardest one so far for me to accept, i dont know if its because i've always been a talker or if its more about me effectively disapearing if I dont have the ability to communicate my thoughts, which in essence is whats happening more and more. I've always been a good listener but i've also been a big part of any conversation, though not anymore. I'm left with no other choice but to observe and i still have so much more to say, so much more and i'm not really ready to let this one be taken from me. Although i do know it will more than likely happen, if it keeps continuing in the direction its been going since it started, i'm just not ready, yet!

So whats your story, how do you deal with it, any tips or tricks etc. please tell!

Hugs........JJ    

[Sailorsong]

You misunderstood what I was saying about the conversations. My friend and I would be talking about the same thing, but with all of the wrong words, mispronounced words, etc our friends would not know what we were talking about. But for some strange reason we alway could understand what each other was saying because our minds would translate those wrong words and mispronounced words into what they should have been due to not hearing things correctly.

For example we might be talking about something to do with fashion and the trouble we have with the care of some items. My friend might say something about washing things and use dishwasher instead of washing machine, But I would hear it as washing machine instead of dishwasher or because I swap those two words a lot myself I would know she meant to say washing machine. But our friends would hear the dishwasher as she said it and get confused as to why she would be washing clothes in a dishwasher.

I also have the same kind of problems with reading things. there was a craft store I drove by almost every day and they had a sign in their window which read "We have all kinds of beads". most of the time when I drove by and read the sign it would be "We have all kinds of beds" in my mind.  It didn't matter how many times  I drove by and that I knew what the sign really said I kept on reading it wrong.

As for you latest question in this topic, yes it has been getting worse over the years. Not so much in not being able to access the information in my mind, but taking longer to get it.

When I had my NeuroPsych testing the doctor told me that it is typical to see a slowing of processing in PwMS, which is what causes these problems.  It isn't that we don't know the words we are having problems saying, it is that our brains are taking to long to find the information so they panic and we say the wrong word, or mispronounce the words, or stutter, etc. in order to just get something out. I suspect this is more of a problem for those that have always been talkative as their personality wants them to just keep on talking no matter what.

Also no jaw problems here other than when I get hit with TN.  But since I don't talk much especially now maybe that is why I have no jaw problems.

Dennis

[Mandella77]

I thought that I was alone!!!!  I really started to believe that I was losing my mind!!  I have always been excellent at communicating, and I love to talk (perhaps too much sometimes) but lately whenever I am trying to explain something or give more then a two word answer I am totally lost. It is like I have a fog or film over my brain and eyes!  It's like deep deep inside I know what it is that I want to say but the words are like another language!  

I did not realize that this can be such an issue in regards to MS but I guess I should have known. I don't like to blame all of my issues on MS but more and more it seems as though my MS plays a role in all of my problems, physically and mentally.  I thought the physical shortcomings would be the worst but feeling like I am crazy or losing my mind is far more damaging to my confidence!  

Thank you for writing about this issue as it has made me aware of yet another symptom that I was experiencing.

[supermum_ms]

Just wondering, do you guys also have jaw hinge and pain issues too?

I've had this on and off for donkey's years, my mouth opening has been getting smaller and smaller ever year, strangely my lower jaw has receeded and my jaw has twisted though i'm not sure if thats due to the spasms or if the twisting is causing the jaw to spasm more and more. Umm it hurts!!

The other wonder (lol) would you say your speeking is getting worse or is it the same as when it first started?

Wondering...........JJ

[maxthecat43]

I have been doing that for years!  I am frequently trying to describe things in broad terms.  ("You know! the thing that does..." Follows lots of hand gestures. LOL!) My husband has gotten pretty good at figuring out what I am trying to say.  

I also find that I don't spell things very well anymore.  (I am grateful for 'spell check'.) Also, it takes me forever to post a reply!  I keep missing letters in  the words I am trying to write.

Arrgh!
Tammy

[supermum_ms]

Whooo hoooo is knew i wasn't alone!! ;D

Wow that above sentence is ironic, not what i intended but thats how it came out, sort of like my verbal ROFL!

Jibby: Do you find that whilst your processing, the conversation has gone on with out you and you now cant really say anything? I do! With my Aspie kids, i've always said what i mean and mean what i say, its simple and safe lol they need it that way but now confusion rains soooo not helpfull. Though i suppose on the other hand, they are having to learn to deal with not understanding and find ways to communicate their confusion, with someone safe and none combative. oh agh, I'm another teaching tool lol

Francyna: refridgerator lol i cant even say it. I got tested, I wanted to know but at the same time didn't, so i get why you cancelled. I really didn't need any test to tell me my brain had fried out on me, pretty easy to tell when you counldn't find your husband and kids names, i was calling our daughter the blonde one.lol that was a couple of years ago now, then i'd lost 30-45 IQ points which is huge, lol and i was tested on a good day, i so dont want to know now!

Whisperwolf; been there done that, even got a t.shirt, well not exactly, just a nice picture of my brain full of holes. lol

Dennis: God you crack me up, i have a picture in my head of you both talking totally different conversations and neither of you aware lol Hey one of my best assets was the ability to turn technical into plain terms, I use to write manuals too but i think my writing skills are also going bye bye, it takes me hours to write anything ahhh bugger! "You know that thing" lol I say "whats the name of ..." nouns are my enemy, i spend half a conversation describing the word i've lost lol

Cheers........JJ

PS: Fair warning everyone in cyberland, this girls brain is fried so if you ever interpretate something i've written as a negative, um then you'd be forgetting i'm not that type of person, please remember ME!

[Sailorsong]

Oh do I know what you mean!

In my case I have never been much of a talker but a great listener. Over the years most women that I have know have told me that I'm a great listener because I listen like a woman. LOL But when I did talk I was very good at expressing my thoughts and ideas to any class of people so that they could understand what I was talking about. This was one of my best assets as a computer design engineer because I had to put technical terms into plain ordinary speech in order to get business types to understand the designs I worked on.

Of course due to MS my ability to communicate has suffered greatly with the same problems you were talking about. But I have also noticed that my listening ability has also suffered because I don't always hear what someone says correctly. Someone might say "washer" but that is not what I hear. I might hear wisher, cleaner, or water for example. So I'm the one with the confused look on my face. So far I do know when I miss hear someone as far as I know.

So here is the good news I have found. When I talk with someone with the same communication problems we can usually understand each other perfectly. It is like when they say the wrong word I don't hear what they said but what they should have said.

I first noticed this when I lived in Florida. A woman I knew at the time had a brain ectomy after a auto accident to save her life. As a result when ever she got tired she would experience the same problems we face. But we alway were able to understand each other due to this switching of words by our brains. We would talk for hours on end and then notice the friends with us had confused looks on their faces because they had no idea what we were saying to each other.  Since then I have noticed the same thing when talking to my brother (MS) and others with these cognitive problems.

So I have come to the conclusion that I should only talk with people with these problems. LOL

BTW my thesauruses is also broken now so I tend to just say "You know  that thing".   LOL

Dennis

[Francyna]

Finally it's out!!!! Girl I've been calling things by the wrong name for the past year now. It is so embarrasing. My favorite one is when I refer to everything as a refridgerator. There's countless others. I definitely understand your feelings. I too enjoyed conversing with people and be quick to respond ,especially at a joke, that I miss most. Being able to respond appropiatetly at  the right time to keep the fun going, now I may start out strong with a come back but sadly find myself @ a lost of words in mid sentence or a faint slur may come.

Last week I took a zannex one night before I went to sleep. The next morning I went to work oh what a mistake. My co-workers really thought I was drugged.  So embarassing....could'nt believe it, the word was I was acting lethargic....so you know I was slurring words.

  I now  know not to do that. So now I feel I just added fuel to the already lit
Fire with me being conscience of my speech, all  eyes on me....

  I was told crossword puzzles, basically brain teasers will help with memory. I was scheduled to get a neurophyc. test.. to see how many brain cells I acually have left. I cancelled @ the last minute I rather not know....

[jibjen]

Hi there,

You sound like me...I have those difficulties too but I tend to find myself talking less and trying to sort it out BEFORE I talk. LOL sometimes it works and sometimes it does not....

I also notice my thought processes is delayed....I seem to have to sit with information now and absorb it a bit to process it before I can respond....

Jibby

[whisperwolf]

I would definately see a neurologist for this and have a brain scan done (MRI or CT).