I have a problem with speaking and was wondering if any of you have had similar problems and how you overcame them.
I have been full time for two and a half months and have been going to voice therapy for a month longer than that. My therapist says I speak well while I am in class. I also practice frequently at home and feel fairly ok with it. My problem is that I just cannot bring myself to speak in front of others. Friends, family, colleagues or strangers; it makes no difference. I just panic and either say nothing at all or speak in my old voice. I hate it, but I am not sure what to do about it. It is exceedingly difficult to live life silently and speaking in my old voice brings up horrible dysphoria. I have looked into the Yeson surgery, but I am not sure if this will help me with my problem as it seems more psychological than physiological.
Thanks for you thoughts,
Mary

Hi Mary,

Not unusual for such hurdles when you're just beginning. It's all about self confidence. Try this trick to get you going. You obviously can do it quite well, you just need a starting point.

Here's the trick. Start all your opening sentences with a word, like, "Well" or something you're comfortable with. Use this word to pitch your voice to where you're comfortable with it and let this pitch continue throughout your reply. Once you've mastered the pitch and can do it automatically, start working on modulating the voice. Don't try and do it all at once. You need to train the brain as well as the voice for it to become automatic.

Also, don't just do a bit of practice at home and in class, make it a full time thing. As you are full time, theres no need to go back to the old one. You achieve much faster that way.

Good luck and keep up the good work.

Huggs
Catherine

Hello Catherine Sarah,
Thank you for the advice. I will try it for sure. I wish I could speak full-time. I know that it would help a lot and make my life a lot easier. However, I have such horrible anxiety when I need to speak. I just panic. It is horrible. Small steps I guess.
Mary   

I'm the same way.  I practice with a friend, and during practice I use what I call my "practice voice" since it's not quite at passing level, though it's much less deep guy sounding like my borned voice. However, once we leave the coffee shop or wherever and we start walking, back to the old voice.

Hi smile,

Congratulations. You too have the answer to your problem. Now, next time you're in the coffee shop and doing your regular best, leave the coffee shop in mid conversation, so your voice continues along outside, without a break.

Ignore anyone outside, concentrate on the discussion and just keep going. Soon it'll become a habit you can't break. And remember, practice, practice, practice.

Huggs
Catherine

Even in mid conversation, it'll go back down when we leave the coffee shop.   It's a mental game that I have to "learn" my way out of the maze to be able to speak freely. I realize it is. I think it's a confidence issue, most likely.

Quote from: Mary81 on March 05, 2014, 06:16:22 AM
I have a problem with speaking and was wondering if any of you have had similar problems and how you overcame them.
I have been full time for two and a half months and have been going to voice therapy for a month longer than that. My therapist says I speak well while I am in class. I also practice frequently at home and feel fairly ok with it. My problem is that I just cannot bring myself to speak in front of others. Friends, family, colleagues or strangers; it makes no difference. I just panic and either say nothing at all or speak in my old voice. I hate it, but I am not sure what to do about it. It is exceedingly difficult to live life silently and speaking in my old voice brings up horrible dysphoria. I have looked into the Yeson surgery, but I am not sure if this will help me with my problem as it seems more psychological than physiological.
Thanks for you thoughts,
Mary

Actually, I didn't really go to Yeson to get a feminine voice as I could already produce a fairly passable voice. I went to solve mostly your exact situation of not being able to use my practiced voice in public. I had a hard time using it since I didn't like to feel like I was faking a voice, and I didn't want to have to think about it all the time. I also didn't want to have to worry about things out of my control, like laughing, coughing, etc.

Those are the main reasons I went to Yeson, which are mostly phycological and not physical like you say. I don't think having a surgery done (whether it's VFS or any other surgery) is necessarily a bad idea just because it's not a completely physical reason for doing it. If you have dysphoria with using your old voice, and you can't bring yourself to use your new voice, then VFS may be a good option to cut out the option of even being able to use your old male voice.

However, I do think it's pretty early in your transition, having only been full-time for a few months. It might make more sense to wait to see if you can overcome the barrier of not being able to use your practiced voice before deciding to get surgery done. I like the suggestions Catherine made. I, myself, was already full-time for about 6 years before I did VFS and that time allowed me to realize that I couldn't overcome my inability to use my practiced voice in certain situations. Now that I've had it done I barely ever think about my voice anymore, and when I do it still doesn't stop me from expressing myself (and I realize afterwards that it still sounds feminine, +1).