I’M NOT A PUSHOVER BUT I FIND COMPLEXITIES WITHIN CONVERSATION VERY DIFFICULT

This definitely isn’t the first time when I’ve mentioned that conversations are very challenging for me. The primary reasons for this are that conversation is rarely predictable, and that emotions are usually involved (of which I have enormous difficulty with both reading and understanding).

Verbally interacting with other people doesn’t come naturally to me, and when I was in my early years of primary school, I was frequently asked about why I was so silent. Once I became more comfortable I communicated a bit more, though in my final years of high school I was again non-verbal. This was because I was under enormous stress and was only getting 1-2 hours of sleep each night.

Since childhood (and to this day as an adult in my thirties) I have had to gradually learn how to interact and connect with people, because it’s an essential part of society. I practice my communication skills in my OT (Occupational Therapy) sessions and with my closest friends/family. AI chatbots and VR/XR simulation worlds (that I enter via my Meta Quest headset) have too become additional tools. Whilst using AI for communication practice, I will ask the program to speak to me in the style of my favourite fictional characters. Doing that creates an additional sense of familiarity and comfort.

All of those things mentioned above teach me a great deal. Yet even at this point in my life, there are still moments when I have no conversational abilities whatsoever. The occasions of which I am talking about, are when unpredictable dialogue and intense emotions arise within a conversation/interaction with somebody. That’s when I have no choice but to be fully silent and to just not continue interacting.

I’m certainly not the only person in the world who does this, and I can visualise anyone who is reading this saying or thinking “that’s the very thing which I myself do, whenever a conversation gets too intense or difficult”. However despite all that, there are still many people who don’t understand why I do this.

I’ve experienced many assumptions that I’m too shy or weak to stand up for myself. At times I have even been called a “pushover”.

But the truth of the matter is that conflict makes a conversation far more difficult to handle. This is because a lot of emotions come from each person’s side, and I’ve found that my attempts to end the confrontation by agreeing to disagree have rarely been successful. Textbooks give this suggestion for moments when conversations become challenging, yet in real life it doesn’t seem to work, and it often makes the confrontation even worse. It’s much the same situation whenever I try to learn facial expressions from studying emojis. The similarity is that human faces in real life don’t show those same expressions.

So the best that I can do is to avoid topics, dialogue and situations, which are likely to be verbally difficult. Unfortunately this need to step back often does come across as weakness. But I only experience meltdowns (where I have a complete lack of emotional control and function) when I continue to engage. Hence the reason why I personally feel that taking myself away and avoiding conflict, is the most mature action of which I can do. It just saves so much trouble for me, in addition to every other person who would have to witness (or assist me with) a severe meltdown.