I have a new friend that I met in an online meditation group. (We’re both female, so it’s platonic). She’s nice and we have a lot in common. But she monologues a lot. Whenever she speaks, she goes on for at least ten minutes, goes off onto every tangent imaginable.
Then I utter a few sentences. She never asks anything about what I’ve said. Instead goes into another monologue.
How do I deal with this?
36 comments
Let her talk to a shy introvert đ
Oh God, I know those types of people. Funny enough I was wondering why you used such a strong word like “terrorist” in the title of your post, but now I get it.
Anyways, so there’s a lot of ways you can go about this.
You could just simply pretend to stop being friends with her like ignoring her when she talks. She’ll get extremely angry and upset, but then right before she leaves you alone, you can tell her the truth and how you feel that she never lets you say anything and doesn’t have good listening skills.
If you don’t want to take that drastic route, you can always just interrupt her while she’s speaking and if she gets mad that you’re interrupting her then you tell her it’s not fair that she gets to talk more than you do.
You know just be yourself and don’t worry about making her upset because unfortunately she’s going to have to do some self-reflection before she can learn to properly talk to people.
Looks like it’s time to upgrade my arsenal of conversation weapons. Bring on the interrupting skills!
“we’re both female, so it’s platonic”- c’mon man, it’s pride month
Just loudly talk over them saying “you know what? That reminds me….” And you can either follow that up with a story of your own, or say “I have to urgently go clean my fish tank” lol. People like this are RUDE and I can’t fucking stand them lol. Alternatively, just be like, dude, have you noticed that you’ve been talking for 10 mins straight and you haven’t asked me a single thing? These people need to wake the hell up to their shitty habits ugh. Exhausting to the max
Looks like it’s time to upgrade my arsenal of conversation weapons. Bring on the interrupting skills!
Itâs certainly rude but more than that it indicates a significantly self absorbed personality that doesnât really care much about the experiences and opinions of others. You may find a friendship with this person is draining and ultimately worthless.
I had the same problem with a guy that I “met” on tinder. He used to answer with tons of audio 3+minutes other than texts, I felt overwhelmed. I simply stopped to text him because my interest and energy was not the same. And I’m a person that often do monologues đ
Maybe is a contradiction
Actually I’m one of those guys who talks a lot and doesn’t know when to stop. Midway i see my friends reaction (that they’re bored or just want me to stop) but then they’re too sweet to tell me to stfuđ. And it becomes awkward to just stop midway.
How do I deal with this?
It is objectively rude to monologue, but it is not intentionally rude whereas some of the proposed confrontations in some other posts are and no good will come from trying to shame this person.
All the people I know who do this monologueing have poorly managed ADHD and they either aren’t aware they are doing it or they know they are doing it but genuinely cannot grab the reins of the impulse.
As someone who has dealt with this a ton, you have to treat these conversations very differently than you would treat any other in that you will have to be willing to interrupt, interrupt firmly, at times start talking over them or be like “I have a thought on that when you finish your point”. If you are able to do this with compassion, you will be able to have a two-sided conversation that might still be 60-40, but it won’t be 80-20.
There was, I think (I believe) only one instance in my life in which I was that terrorist. I was hitting rock bottom. A friend txtd me “how are you” and I replied “not great actually” and he offered a phone call and I gladly accepted it. I just went thought stream mode and I took his silence as permission to go on.
Eventually (like 10 minutes passed) he said “Theban86, Theban86, Theban86, listen up, I’ve offered a phone because I want a conversation, are you aware you’ve been talking non-stop? Breath” “So how are you feeling right now?” and my knee jerk reaction were feelings of betrayal and dissapointment (which I did NOT disclouse that to him, I was aware I’m being irrational and he certainly didn’t deserve to hear that) and shame for me doing something which I never appreciated in other people. We started to be more back and forth in the phone call.
I’m very self conscious so that worked. It might help. It’s possible she will have a knee jerk emotional reaction but it’s her responsability on how to deal with that.
1. Start scrolling your phone
2. Put earbuds in
3. Stand up and go away without acknowledging that she’s talking
I think we need a conversation terrorist rehabilitation program.
I just dealt with one who also over shared, told us about every bit of her traumatic past, AND this was all in an eight hour time span where my other coworker and I had to work in an enclosed space with her. My way was talking extremely loud over her when she was interrupting us to go on another oversharing rant or just dropping something to interrupt the flow of the conversation. I had to be a bit rude to get her to understand that I do not like being talked TO not WITH, but really what was I supposed to do? She told us about her abuse and stuff without ever seemingly taking into account how uncomfortable we were. We barely knew her after all. Now she interacts with me more normally than she did last week. Unfortunately ârudeâ is sometimes the only way to go.
Does she have other friends? She might not get out much or have anybody else to talk to. People in that situation have a tendency to store up a lot of information and then when it comes time to chat, they vent.
Or, she lacks a bit of self-awareness and needs to learn some social skills.
It’s almost vampiric and it’s frustrating for the perpetual listener.
I have a friend like this, I usually just listen and ask questions. after a few questions from me and long winded answers from her, she realizes that it feels more like an interview than an conversation. Also, dropping social cues such as checking the time, shifting your body , looking elsewhere, etc. can help, if theyâre able to recognize social cues. If this is seen as rude they may say something like âsorry for boring youâ where you can then express your point of view in a polite but direct way, like âyouâre not boring me, I just feel like I havenât had a chance to participate in this conversation.â And go from there
I have ADHD so I have done this sort of thing a lot where I over dominate the conversation without even realizing it. It is definitely helpful that you let her know it’s an issue so she can consciously learn to hold herself back and be more mindful of other people.
TBH I would end up in a friendship with someone like that. Sheâs being really selfish. What are you getting out of the friendship?
She may be socially anxious..self absorbed as well. My SIL is like this. I just donât really speak and left her drone on and on. Hard to have true relationships with these people.
I have a female coworker who is a huge introvert, seemingly glad someone wants to interact with her, but also never asks anything back. I thought we could vibe but its impossible like that. Talks about my interest as if i know nothing about it because she never asks if i know something first, but also ignores when i heavily hint that i do.
Interrupt her by constant Why
Looks like we need some conversation negotiations 101. But seriously, hope things work out for you!
It’s time to get some new friends. When you have more people who want to talk to you, one person will not be able to hijack all your ear-time đ
Also, sometimes, you start a conversation and start telling her your stories which are like monologues, and see her reaction. Maybe she may not like that. Use her responses to frame your responses in the future.
You open your mouth
Find another friend. She doesnât listen and no amount of new communication skills on your part will change her.
the term “conversation terrorist” seems like the most dramatic shit i’ve ever heard in my life. stop talking to this person if they don’t have any interest beyond themselves.
Withdraw attention from such people. I know it feels incredibly uncomfortable and rude (it is,) but that’s exactly how people who only know to talk about themselves should be feeling. If their parents didn’t teach them that, your two options are to tell them directly (and it doesn’t sound like you have enough invested into this friendship to warrant that) or to avoid them. Hopefully enough such experiences will prompt them to recognize that they’re the problem.
I typically fade people like this out. I refer to this as a verbal wall of word vomit. I *strongly* suspect most people who do this *know* that as soon as soon as there is a break in the conversation, folks are hanging up. Some friends it was due to loneliness; one friend I just recently cut off, I suspect it was outright manipulative and conniving behavior (she began showing signs of some type of personality disorder or mental health breakdown). She would be word vomiting *literally* an hour or two, and I had to just break in in the middle of full sentences (sheâd be saying something like âSo check this out, the next thing you know, the girl pulls out aâŠâ and Iâd have to say âHey, hey, hey, sorry to cut you off, but Iâve got to goâ). Abruptly and mid-sentence. Thatâs how nonstop her talk was.
I think we need a conversation terrorist rehabilitation program.
>(We’re both female, so it’s platonic)
lol
I think we need a conversation terrorist rehabilitation program.
Converse with those that donât do this. If they want to converse with you, they can learn to stay on topic and share the conversation. If not, they can try with someone else.
âCan u shut the fuck up and listen to meâ
âExcuse me, I gotta go to the bathroom.â
*<ghosts>*
INTERRUPt her, “heyyy did you see this? ” or any of that. And if she keep talking for more than 10 min with out letting you talk cut her off and tell her you have something to do.
Don’t let her be the protagonist of every story.
Looks like we need some conversation negotiations 101. But seriously, hope things work out for you!