like im trying to reach out to people despite how scary it is. im talking and trying not to overthink it. it scares me just doing that. i know its a good thing that i keep putting myself out there. but i havent learned how to deal with rejection or people not liking me. i know i dont sound the most confident. it just feels like im doing something wrong and i dont know what it is. like if there was a manual for this i would read it front to back at this point. i dont have a plan, im in my 20’s, and im fine with that for now. but when other people question it i get self conscious. what if my fears are true and im actually unlikable?? ugh

I had SM from ages 5-12, but in the later years I would say I was improving with speech therapy. I’ve been socially stunted ever since. It’s improved a lot and I feel like I was socially at my “peak” performance so to say a year ago; I had a group of friends and we’d plan cute hangouts or parties, I was in decently well with my sports team at school. But since then it’s kinda slipped away as I’ve found pitfalls in my social skills and lost most of my friends.

I find I’m just unable to make connections with people. I try to work with my awkwardness to make it funny (I know a guy who can do this and I think he’s hilarious), but maybe I’ve gotten lazy, or I’m just struggling with severe brain fog and my humor is just not doing what it needs to be for me to be performing properly in social situations. I’m probably just being too hard on myself since I lost my friend group last year, but every friendship I try to make just never goes anywhere and I feel like a weirdo that nobody likes that much. I feel like people think I’m okay enough to be around but they wouldn’t choose to be partnered with me for a project or to invite to the after-work/school party they are having.

I dunno I feel like I’ve given up and I just can’t properly be social anymore. I can brainstorm why people don’t like me all day but it’s not going to help because my vibe must be totally bad or something. At my last couple side jobs i made “enemies”, then at my career job the leadership likes me but im not fun to hangout with at outside of work events apparently, and in general i feel like no one would CHOOSE to hang out with me over another option. So I don’t talk to anyone at school anymore, or when I start my new job I’m going to keep to myself. I give up!! I have my wonderful husband at least and my parents. And I have a couple friends I check in with here and there, but I think it’s wraps for me besides that. Hey, at least I got the hardest relationship to attain secured and bagged a husband— it’s hard to find the one when the romance scene is in shambles these days. All in all, I think my social slowness is coming to a head at this time in my life and I’m seeing very clearly where my years of having SM really stunted my social development. And I’m getting too old to catch up since my brain is almost fully developed. My parents are complementary to me and say people just feel threatened by my drive to succeed/my kind, genuine personality/talents in xyz, etc, but I feel they are just biased. I don’t think I’m better than anyone either so I would hope I’m not giving off some kind of bad competitive energy. I just feel like my years of being mute messed me up and I can’t keep up socially and don’t know how to catch up.

Anyway- hopefully somebody can relate to some of this or at least understand. I feel so bottled up about all this and no one in my circle can relate to me in that way. If you have any advice or words of encouragement I’d love to hear it, or even if anyone relates lmk!! Thanks if you read all this i appreciate it <3

And please be kind in the comments I’m not looking for any hateful energy 😭** **

this topic was brought up in one of the discord servers i'm in, and while i wasn't part of the discussion it confused me a bit. one user said something along the lines of "selectively mute person" and another (who i am fairly certain is not affected by selective mutism themself) replied that that term was offensive according to this source: https://www.accessibility.com/glossary/mute but i don't see any clear reason it's considered offensive here, and only seems to be talking about the term "deaf-mute" (which is an entirely different and largely inaccurate term, to my knowledge).

the other user also said that a better term would be "nonspeaking" but not "nonverbal" because apparently "nonverbal" has a connotation of not understanding any words at all. i haven't heard of this definition either.

while i can definitely understand that you should never use "mute" as a noun (ex. "a mute") i don't understand not using it as an adjective? i would really just like some clarification from people who actually have firsthand experience with SM! thank you in advance.