How do monologuers keep thinking of things to say?

[Fuckstix]

I don't mean any offence by this but I've come across quite a few people in my time who are happy to simply talk at you, going into great detail about their lives and opinions, rather than converse. Many are aware of this. I've got better at politely not entertaining it but it still occurs sometimes.

My mum is one, a woman I work with occasionally is another to an extreme extent. As in, I knew about her menstrual cycle, contraception usage, travel history, marital issues, sons health, husband's career, neighbours etc etc before I think she had even remembered my name. She just didn't stop.

Today, my mum rang to ask me how my holiday to Italy was with my partner who is from there. Within 2 minutes, she had launched into a detailed account of a coach trip she took years ago in a totally different part of the country.

It has got me wondering how people like this keep thinking of stuff to say and why others' input is so unimportant to them.

Honestly this isn't a critical post of enthusiastic talkers, I am genuinely interested! If you have any insight, I would be so interested to hear it.

My dad is autistic and can be a bit of a monologuer. I just don't think he gets the social cues about how someone is feeling about his very detailed explanation of xyz.

I am autistic and the same, although hyper-aware of it! I often think to myself 'I've explained a little bit about x, so now I need to sit up and find a question to ask the other person'. I'm always looking out for cues in other people's body language to suggest they're bored by what I'm saying. It makes a conversation with people I don't know well very difficult for me. I'm also aware of doing it on here! I mostly want to post comments that are about my own experience and have to stop myself a lot! Although this feels pertinent perhaps (apologies if not!).

So I'm not saying the people you meet who do this are all ND. But just an explanation of why some people may do it.

I once flat shared with a monologuer. She just talked and talked and needed no feedback from you to keep going. I once got up in her mid flow to get ready for bed. She followed me, talking non stop, whilst I brushed my teeth, washed my face, went into my bedroom and got into bed. She stood there, in my room, talking at me whilst I was in bed.

Her monologues were very boring too. If you talk that much, you just can’t be interesting.

@Andsoforth i think there are 3 types of people who do this:

1. neurodiverse - they don’t understand they are doing and that not everyone is interested in the same subject but I find when you try to interject they are usually apologetic or become conscious that they have talked to much. I have time for them (also nd, ds is nd and I work with those who are nd so I’m quite used to these monologues)
2. socially anxious - people desperate to be included and fit in but struggle with anxiety so tend to overshare or go off on a tangent because they want to be seen like they can relate. This group I believe compassion and asking them questions as listening is really important as they will go away and play the conversation over in the head, mentally beating themselves up over it.
3. the self important narcissists - people who just think the sun shines out their arse and have no interest in other people and just talk about themselves all.the.time. Insufferable and rude

you are right, we do need to have more compassion though

I think most people these days can recognise when someone is ND, elderly, anxious, nervous, shy and babbling, or somewhat mentally unwell.

If you've not met anyone who sucks the life out of you via relentless monologuing, then you seriously have no idea what is being discussed (in between all the #BeKind posts).

I "had more compassion" until I sent myself into a decades plus flare of multiple autoimmune diseases.

I know I do this sometimes.

It's like I have two modes 'on' and 'off'.

I can stay totally silent in conversations nodding and mhmming along but people then think I'm being rude as I'm not contributing.

If I start talking then I seem to replay 'scripts' in my head on the particular subject that is being spoken about - but they are the same or very similar each time and don't always directly relate to the conversation in hand.

I start to see people glaze over and try to shut up, sometimes just stopping midsentence.

I then go back to the silence, internally shouting at myself for talking at all.

I can just about manage short reciprocal remarks about the weather or something with definitive answers, but otherwise off I go.

Sometimes I actually cover my own mouth or clamp down on my tongue to shut myself up.

Another thread of superior ‘quieter’ people , bashing the noisy chatty ‘dim’ people.

Some people like chatting. It’s their personality. I would love sharing an office with a chatty person. It’s easy to ask them to be quiet without causing offence if you have very basic skills in establishing a boundary.

There are lots of reasons people over talk. Personality? Lack of self awareness? Sometimes it’s social anxiety. It’s just as annoying when people go really quiet and don’t know what to say and there’s as awkward silence. But apparently that’s superior doesn’t mean they are ‘dim’ and they aren’t accused of being dim. Everyone feels sympathetic.

Honestly mumsnet makes you scared to speak. Here are the things that mumsnetters have complained about others talking about this year:
themselves (self absorbed)
others (gossip)
asking questing (nosey)
their children (showing off)
their own hobbies family etc (boring)
stories about their adventures/experiences (self absorbed)
any ‘opinion ‘ on anything other than weather

and yes I understand nuance. But conversation is a skill and sometimes people haven’t been taught it, and add that to a social anxiety and a naturally friendly chatting nature. And you have a talkative persons. Also, some people need more social input than others.

Apparantly mumsnetters don’t want to make friends on the school run or where ever, they just want to get on and drop kids off. But woe betide anyway who makes friends with a group of other chatty people. Then you’re being cliquey!

Oooh look now I’ve done a dim witted brain dump and makes myself look stupid and bored everyone on this thread.

so yes I know I’m being defensive here. I do have awareness. But just like quiet people are allowed to be quiet. We are allowed to be chatty. And if you don’t like it, just politely ask us to stop. It’s not a biggie.

Gosh it’s makes you realise all this ‘be yourself not what others want you to be’ that schools and mental health organisations push is a load of rubbish.
It’s actually ‘be yourself but not if that means being an extrovert and upsetting all the superior introverts by trying to engage them in enthusiastic conversation’ 🙄

I can stay totally silent in conversations nodding and mhmming along but people then think I'm being rude as I'm not contributing.

If you are able to stay silent, ever, then I don't think you are the sort of talker being discussed. This is not an occasional behaviour.

Have you read the OP? It's not about bashing anyone, it's genuine interest in where those who talk at length without input get their subject matter from.

Plus those being discussed aren't trying to engage anyone in conversation, they are monologuing. Spilling their guts without any prompt. This is what's interesting, not people who are simply chatty and enjoy talking with others.

It’s just thinking out loud…. It helps to order your thoughts…

I appreciate the OP wasn’t bashing but it didn’t take long for someone to say they were dim did it 🤷🏼‍♀️

@Stupidbonfire

It isn't you! Bet you've never stood at a hospital bed, droning on to a semi-conscious patient you've never seen before, until the point where they throw up!

Another thread of superior ‘quieter’ people , bashing the noisy chatty ‘dim’ people.

Another poster completely missing the point. This is not about chatty people.

I’m not missing the point of the OP. I’m commenting on the fact that it didn’t take long for a pile on about how dim chatty people are.

Or maybe I just missed the point because I’m dim and chatting too much…

This is a really interesting thread. I think so many of you have nailed it. My experiences of monologue-ers are that I attract them. I agree with @Andsoforth - great post! I have friends who are most likely ND, so that can be one reason for the monologue. Autistic folk often have deep interests they are passionate about and will talk about happily for ages - info-dumping about a favourite theme is actually a sign the person feels comfortable. Also, not reading social cues, when to turn-take can mean an Autistic person just keeps going. I agree that some people have narcissistic or obsessive traits and have a pressure to just keep talking. The person might also be very lonely. My lovely mum was an arch monologue-er and I felt it stopped us from having any real depth to conversations a lot of the time. She did the thing where she would ‘pinball’ from topic to topic, sometimes mid sentence! I’d have to ask her what she was talking about sometimes. She had always been like that, but age made it worse. Maybe due to being around my mum, I actually enable monologue-ers. I listen, I ask questions and I’m not a big sharer of my stuff unless I feel very comfortable with someone. So, I think people get ‘permission’ to talk at me. I do try and set boundaries now, and perhaps spend less time with monologuing people. I also volunteer information, as occasionally that stops someone in their tracks. I think monologues are a different thing from pouring out one’s heart about a single issue. It’s thinking aloud without a filter.

It’s also a learning style.

To repeat what you think out loud to see if it makes sense and to invite feedback? If people keep quiet it’s assumed that the speaker has ordered their thoughts correctly. It’s actually helpful to challenge the content to allow for further exploration of thoughts .

it’s just thinking out loud. Like you all do in your head. But out loud. I get it’s annoying. But just ask us to be quiet. Having self awareness is fine, but obviously it slips when you’re deep in a moment figuring something out, out loud.

I have a relative like this. If there's a lull in conversation she immediately jumps to fill it with something extremely inane like talking about what she had for breakfast in excruciating detail. If you're in the car with them, it will just be "look there's a cow, oh there's more, there's a brown one over there, oh look in that field it's got sheep in" she doesn't pause for breath and there's no deep or interesting or two way conversation or any interest in the news/politics/environment/family news or what is going on in your life; it really is like being with a child - say what you see, and subsequently exhausting!

In saying all that she is extremely kind hearted and I do love her company in other ways!

Lol. Spot the completely oblivious person who has no idea how much they grate on other people, being completely and insistently oblivious, even in the face of being TOLD no one likes to be monologued at!
”I know, people are telling me they would rather not hear a long diatribe. They clearly have no idea what they want, I’m the best, I know better, what they need is a nice long diatribe”
It’s just hilarious. And sad.

I think some of this is how you are brought up too. My gran does this. She will spend ten mins telling you how exciting her point is. How you won't be able to believe it! Then builds up part of the story, stops to tell you again that it's simply incredible and she is so excited to tell you. Then never gets round to telling you or the point passes you by because you have no idea it happened and it really wasn't exciting. It's the tangents that don't help.

Based on this, my mum has no learned manner of conversation. She talks about herself all the time because growing up, she never had the opportunity and wasn't listened too. My gran is currently in hospital and she xalled me late at night (knowing I go to bed super early to get up early) to give me an irrelevant update of every inconsequential interaction with a nurse or doctor. I had to say to her "you're talking a lot but you're not telling me anything. Do we have a diagnosis?" We did not.

As a receiver of two generations of unnecessary conversations, I try to make everything as concise as I can and panic about rambling.

The other side of the family requests that if you're hearing a story they have told before, you put a finger up for each time you've heard it and they laugh and move on.

In addition, my mum now lives alone with dogs. She gives the dogs a monologue of her day (poor things) and is now so in the habit that she will do this when I visit whether I am mid comment or she is so I am interrupted or her monologues simply go on forever to multiple unwilling audiences.

It’s also not “being an extrovert” as @Stupidbonfire seems to think. I am an extrovert but I can control myself and act socially appropriately. Being extroverted is actually more about deriving your energy source from external influences, it’s not about “chatting” people half to death.

Very clever way of shutting down my side of the conversation. I see what you did there.…

But the whole point of the thread is that it’s not a conversation which is a two way thing, it’s just one person going on and on without stopping.

I have a friend like this. Goes on and on about stuff without drawing breath and if I do manage to get a word in edge ways or (rare) she asks me anything it’s very obvious that she’s just waiting for
it to be her turn to talk again.

I avoid seeing her as much as possible to be honest. It feels mean but I can just about cope with a cinema trip or the odd lunch. She’s also a serial interruptor. I’ve tried just carrying on talking which can work but really what’s the point If she’s not interested?

She doesn’t have many friends. Can’t think why. She’s fallen out with a few people and from her telling me - in great detail - various details of the disagreement I suspect they get fed up of her too.

Sample convo:

Her: “Did x go to the doctor about his toe in the end?” (ailment changed)

Me (astounded she’s even asking): “Yes they said…”

Her: “My Brian had a bad toe once, did I tell you? Listen to this….”

She then talked about her Brian’s toe FOR HALF AN HOUR SOLID without once breathing in.

Or she just makes it obvious she has no interest in anything pertaining to anyone else. Eg

Me: “I had a great day at work today - some really lovely new clients…”

Her: “Oh right. Ooh I had the car MOT’d today and they said…” and she’s off for a good 15 minutes.

No give and take. No ebb and flow. Just talking about herself. Oh, unless she’s talking at me about people she knows that I’ve never met.