SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

I can't be the only person dealing with an individual who cannot process a full sentence, can I? Anybody else ever dealt with this?

I should have learned by now to speak in "telegraphic language" to my H like one does with a 3 year old. I mean, I guess I need to learn to speak in bullet points. "See Spot Run," instead of "See Spot Run and Come Back to the House!" Very often, any words after the first few sounds I make go "in one ear and out the other!" So aggravating, when I know it isn't a hearing problem (we both have some middle-aged hearing loss, especially me. An audiologist once tested his hearing and it worked just fine. Told him his problem was "higher in the brain!" LOL)

Today I had such a clear example of our trouble communicating that I think someone ought to go for a medical consult. What is going on? Anything familiar-sounding, guys? If so, how did you cope with the aggro?

(Background: I need some new meds for my cardiac condition and they're expensive, but nobody can tell me how expensive. I was told by the pharmacist to ask our insurance company how much I'll have to pay for Medicare Tier 3 or higher drugs. This is all hitting me new. My regular BP Rx was a Tier 1 generic with a zero co-pay.)

Monday, H said our insurance agent can check on prices because she did it for him and I could call her rather than some national toll-free number. So I text the agent the drugs I may have to take and my text goes through as a "Sent" message. But then H remarks how I texted her office phone he thinks is a landline and might not be able to receive a text. After no reply all day, I decided to do what he suggested and call and leave her a voice mail with the same question; she is super busy this time of year. I told H that I left her the same question on her voice mail.

By Wednesday, no reply. Tomorrow I need to see the doctor who will expect me to start taking these $$$ Rxs. Just now, I call my H and ask him if he'd be kind enough to call her, as I hate to pester someone with the same question and perhaps he'd have better luck; she screens all her calls. I repeated to him on the phone how I'd already left her a voice mail the other day.

Here is how I phrased it: "..because I already have texted her AND left her a voice mail."

His response is to lecture me on the same bit as the other day about possibly no text capability. Kinda rude I felt, since he cut me off. Thinking about his frequently missing incoming verbal information I try to convey to him, I think he never "processed" the last half of my SHORT SENTENCE. Maybe he only "heard" the first part, since it rang a familiar bell with him. I find this happens a whole lot. If I send him 2 phrases in the same sentence, his reply usually will only address the first part of the thought that generated my sentence and so I have to try again.

In cognitive psychology, they call that the Primacy Effect of working memory: we best remember the first part of things. In dementia, though, it can be a sign of cognitive decline or other brain disorders. If he did this generally, I'd really be worried, but I've never heard this kind of fumble among the guys he talks with every day. It's like just with me, he'll snatch a word or 2 out of my sentence context and just run off with it like a game fish with a lure. Reel him back!! Hang on!! It's a lot of extra work and frustration for me trying to hammer out meaningful communication exchanges with him.

Earlier today, same deal. In that case, I'd walked into a wide hallway just as I finished a (short) sentence he claimed he didn't "hear" the last part of. (It was: "Please turn on my laptop...so I can print you this chart.") He turns on the laptop for me then heads for the door to leave. I allow as how he didn't catch the last part, okay. Forget that we had just been discussing the medical info the chart would illustrate, and I'd said it would help us to look at the diagram. (He is a former Air Force jet mechanic by the way, so no stranger to schematics).

But then, on this phone call with no background interruption and my same intonation, he cuts in and "attacks" the first half of my sentence? As though he thinks I don't remember what he said the other day and he needs to school me again? Oye...See why I need cardiac meds? J/K)

[This message edited by Superesse at 9:16 PM, Thursday, November 7th]

I have some experience, but it's a bit different than yours. My XWH is diagnosed with Narcissistic Personality Disorder. I would ask him what he wanted for dinner. Crickets. I figured it was age-related hearing loss, so I'd go into the same room and repeat the question only louder. Eventually he admitted that he didn't answer because he didn't want to. Classic narc discard behavior.

I have met some people that will only hear the first part of a sentence because they are already processing the response and may not hear the second part.

It could be age-related brain issues, too. Ask him if he's not wanting to hear the whole sentence (and he needs to stop it) or if he wants to go see his doctor for an evaluation.

My hearing is unbelievable - to the doctor testing me! - eyes not so good but nose and ears still working good.

wife? well - two things

One she (is this a female thing) and to speak about everything she does. (exceptions do happen)
"I'm going to start fixing dinner."
"Going outside to prune the rosebushes"
etc.

Now my ears would perk up if she said she was going to set a fire in the woods!

Two
So? Many times she says something and none of the words trigger my attention.
Or - she will be saying something to me while walking into another room!

and - SHE has hearing issues - so I have to make extra effort to always be close enough (so I don't have to speak extra loud) so she can hear and make sure I am facing her and her facing me.

She bought some Apple Airtags for cat collars. She can't hear the beep they can generate. I can hear it @ 50 ft. or more.

All this to imply your husband may have hearing problems -

Haha, Hippo I thought you were going somewhere else with the selective attention thing. I have no doubt there is some of that going on. Like he is really, really visual (to the point that for us to even stay together after his online-addiction Infidelities, he had to go cold turkey off electronics with screens!)

But he runs a business out of my house and he needs to occasionally search for odd parts for his customer's collector cars. I hate that job, so I let him use my laptop, but only if I'm willing to sit in the same room (sickening having to babysit a SAWH but otherwise, he can always get his own place...is the deal.) But even now, if he is parked in front of a computer screen, the ears just Do.Not.Work! I usually have to call time on the searching...once he sits down at the computer he cannot seem to tear himself away - and I can see the screen. He's so addicted to the Visual Channel that he's just not able to attend to the Auditory Input!

The last 10 years or so, if I'm needing to speak to him while he is doing anything with his hands, I have to wait. He either snaps at me "Wait!" or else I can just repeat it all, later. He didn't used to be this bad; he is mid-60's now.

I know he had to go to speech therapy as a kid and was somewhat dyslexic too, but that has improved with practice. Several years ago, I got so fed up I told him he'd be smart to take a course in Communications and he enrolled at our local community college. Darned if he didn't Ace his first college course: Public Speaking 101!

Made zero difference at home. Like he learned nothing about sender-receiver, context, interference, all the basics he was taught. Hell, his first week's class handout was exactly what I'd been trying to get him to understand for years: if you don't connect with someone's message and also let them know you got their message, you have not communicated well. His instructor's Powerpoint was just 2 parellel lines drawn between 2 big circles, one labelled Sender, one labelled Receiver. Anything that breaks up the straight lines is Noise (Interference). This man wired up aircraft for the military and later did the same for an auto race team, so it seemed like he could grasp that radio concept....but not when it's with me.

I do think there is some brain issue, but here's the painful part: what he does always could be interpreted as dismissive (think Archie and Edith Bunker!) because so often with us, he'll "start over from Adam and Eve," like my Father used to gripe about. Annoying having to go over ground we've already covered as if he thinks I never picked it up (subliminally insulting - especially when we are talking about topics in my career field that I've introduced him to!) I have just never observed this kind of patronizing "talking down" to his work associates whom we have lunch with almost every day. With them, he is always charming, mutual and genuinely helpful. One of them called him tonight, and they happily chattered on for 10 minutes and I didn't hear them get confused. Seems like if he had a true physical cognitive issue, it would show up across the board.

Leafields, maybe mine is a Narcissist with Auditory Processing issues that overlap!? Thanks guys, I just need to lower my BP and this issue baffles me to no end.

Gently…

"Darned if he didn't Ace his first college course: Public Speaking 101!

Made zero difference at home"

I lived for decades with a husband who objectively treated me very differently from how he treated other people in his life. I tried to understand the "why". My truth is that his "why" did not matter. And the fact I was googling his behavior towards me. Or that I somehow thought that keeping my husband from having his privates falling on other women was in any way my task to do. Or that keeping him from spending inordinate amounts of time and energy gaining online attention rather than pouring his energies into the relationship and our mutual lives was in any way my responsibility.

It was all a losing game I finally stopped playing. What would have actually mattered was his desire to be in a monogamous mutually supportive loving relationship with me. And his doing the actual hard work to do this. I am no longer with him and it is so generally peaceful and conflict-free.

I have significant and potentially life threatening physical issues I am dealing with from the decades of stress. At this point I am not sure I have the strength or resilience to survive. The relationship took that much from me. This is why I encourage people to take radical care of themselves and their children if they have them.
I believe these sorts of relationships are very damaging to my nervous systems and my physical, emotional, mental and spiritual selves and that life can be genuinely peaceful for me. It just could not be for me with exwh.

I hope you find much peace and healing.

Shehawk, you make excellent points and I'm with right with you.

This heart condition I'm now stuck with had to have developed over time as things in this M stayed "Stuck in Limbo." A doctor once told me that it isn't the spikes in your BP that get you, it's the steady overload on your heart of being hypervigilant/hypertense. He said most people with High Blood Pressure are "hyper" by nature, whether they were born that way or life trauma produced that fight-or-flight respnse in them. There is actually a condition called "Broken Heart Syndrome" that tends to happen among traumatized women, especially after they go through "the change." I am in my 70's and I feel like this whole repeated cycle of betrayal in my 2nd M with my mistaken decision to try and "R" with such a person has led me to literally remodel my only heart. (It didn't help that along the way, different doctors took me off BP meds I should have stayed on, due to my experiencing near-fatal side effects from them. I didn't set out to wreck my health.)

Back to the topic: for me, it's not his past infidelity any longer, it's the day-after-day same stance I am so frozen in: watching how someone else's behaviors feel towards me and wondering what they mean (is he an NPD sort of hopeless case, or is he simply a flawed guy who doesn't mind driving me nuts?) It especially gets to me how nobody outside the M ever can see what is going on.

The other day, I actually got up and removed myself from our lunch table with a mutual friend, a 73 year old, never-married phD who may be on the spectrum, after he blew off a comment I made as unimportant. (We were talking about the topic of "Aspergers" and I said "True, they do have an amazing ability to focus, but it can be hard being in a marriage to someone with it." Oh well, why did I expect an understanding response from that man? He wouldn't know a thing about intimacy!

Just seems like a lot of what I'm talking about could be my H's cluelessness based on a neurobiological impairment (or maybe dementia starting). Everybody else who interacts with him gets a different version than I do and would dispute my interpretation of his actions. I hate to feel his behaviors towards me may be based on fundamental disrespect. The track record of the kind of debasement of women he was into argues that he has no respect for women or is actually subliminally angry at women (mommy issues!). But in any case, he hasn't changed in decades and from what I understand, it is unrealistic of me to expect growth if the person himself cannot - or WILL NOT - see the problems. (A feature of cognitive decline is that the person will struggle hard to hide their problem from themselves, in order to defend against facing the loss of their thinking abilities!)

Maybe I'm different than most other women, but at this stage, after decades of IHS, I do not expect some romantic gesture so much as I am holding out for some basic R.E.S.P.E.C.T. So if my spouse's daily behaviors feel disrespectful to me but are unconscious, not intentional, then maybe I'm the one that has to give up my expectations for companionship and respect? That's why I am in a puzzle.

I hope your physical health bounces back real soon from the trauma you endured and I hope the same for me, too. Today I'm seeing my new doctor to start on the path to whatever future I may have left. He just fixed me breakfast. Sigh.

Superesse,
I can relate to this. I can communicate easily but WH can't process at the same speed. Recently WH said he felt that his childhood trauma had something to do with how well he "heard" or processed what I said to him. His trauma was visited upon him by his sister and mother, so as the primary female in his life I became a representation of his abusers on some level. He is on the spectrum, has OCD and some ADHD, all of which make communication and listening more challenging. Combine that with his selective hearing because I somehow embody the source of his childhood neglect, and at times it adds up to frustration for sure.

I have some hearing loss due to my first career, Air Force flight crew member. This undoubtedly plays a part in not always hearing what my wife says. But I think it is a small part since I don’t have trouble hearing my friends, or when I worked, my clients. A lot of the problem is due to her starting to speak before I know that she’s about to speak. Like when I am reading or working on a mechanical problem. At those times I have to choose to either stop her and ask to start again, or let her continue and see if I can figure out what she is talking about. Either way, it just cements in her mind that I don’t pay attention to her. Hasten to add that I do the same to her.

The other problem is all my fault. I lack patience. I am happy to listen to an interesting anecdote or the background information that explains a conclusion, but when we are trying to make a decision I really just want to get to the answer. For example, the other day we had to decide where to put some savings. The account had a favorable interest rate but it was expiring in a week. We conferred with our financial planner and he suggested three options. I had a pretty good idea where we would both want to put the money but asked for my wife’s thoughts first. She went around and around, repeating the pros and cons. I let it go on for a few minutes but could feel my patience draining fast. I told myself, "If you were dating this woman you’d show her respect and let her come to her own conclusion." I listened for a few more minutes then interrupted and said, "So do you agree that we split the money between option 1 and option 2?" She agreed. But I still feel badly about not letting her state her opinion before I asked her a leading question. Some people are more interested in solving a problem than in sharing the journey. I have worked with Air Force mechanics. As a group they heavily skew towards solving the problem. It sounded to me like your husband thought he saw the problem (texting a landline) told you how to fix or avoid it, and just stopped delving deeper. Like he read a writeup about a vibration at low speed from No. 1 engine, saw a missing rivet on a nacelle and then couldn’t get past that to hear the young airman say that there may be a micro crack in a turbine blade. BTW, I think there is a dose of disrespect involved. If the Maintenance Officer or a senior enlisted mentioned the crack, he would have listened. Same for me, if my boss or a client had gone on and on about CD rates, I would have found the patience to let them finish. I am working on this.

OMG Gray, you married my brother in law? I totally think your WH has the same diagnoses I always toggle between. Some OCD, maybe some ADD (he is Mr. Calm so no "Hyper") and some spectrum maybe (lack of ability to perceive other's realities may be different).
But the abuse mine suffered was sexual abuse as well and multiple family members abused him, male and female. Especially his mother, how sick is that.

Yet he hasn't budged off the template of seeing his primary attachment female as HER. THIS is the source of a lot of the crap I have had to deal with, I'm sure. Thanks and Godspeed.

I told myself, "If you were dating this woman you’d show her respect and let her come to her own conclusion.

This made me laugh. I tell my H treat me like you want a second date.

My husband does have hearing loss. He refuses to buy hearing aids. I have to repeat myself after EVERY sentence. I will repeat in the same tone and same volume and amazingly he hears it. It's exhausting. Sometimes I think he says "huh?" just out of habit. Sidenote * He doesn't do this with others. He is also an overthinker. Almost neurotic. Inside his own head. He will begin a comment/question in mid thought. Like I'm supposed to know what the heck he's talking about. Then of course he'll tell me that he already told me something and I must be losing it!

He will flat out ignore me and I'm not entirely sure if it's because he didn't hear or he's being an a**hole. That hurts. To be minimized or disrespected is the worst. Well, almost the worst.

Perhaps your husband struggles with ADHD or hearing loss. I hope it's not dementia. Horrible disease. Perhaps you'll need to adjust your communication to 3 word sentences. I have begun to stop talking and wait. Eventually he'll ask me what I was saying. It sucks, but it makes things a little better for me.

Two more angels just sent to help me this morning, Notsogreatexpectations and Trumans world!!

Now we are en route to my doctor appointment so of course I really had to time what gets said or read in traffic. But I broke out in amazing Wows at your example from your career and when we got to a calm stretch of interstate, I read it to him, as he was driving. He was nodding his head in deep agreement...up until your honest reflection on the element of disrespect, hehehe. But thank you so much for this! It helps me. Hope it will help him too.

Trumansworld, your story is sooo similar. Yes, it is frustrating. Gotta run but keep it coming!

Our Ear Nose and Throat doctor did explain that men lose their upper range frequencies in midlife so they really often don't attend to women's voices. I cannot make out women reading the scriptures from our church podium, as it is!

At some point in the distant past I read or heard that it takes time for someone to really hear a speaker, so it's good to start with some throwaway words/phrases. This thread reminded me of that, and I hope I remember to tell my W.

Do a search on coupons for the expensive drug you (may?) need. Lots of high-priced drugs have special offers. I take one drug that normally costs $500/month. My insurance drops that to $150/90 days - $600/year. The manufacturer charges $10 (ten) /90 days.

Paxlovid is $80 through my insurance, but the pharmacist found a coupon that dropped the price down to $20.

Sisoon, thank you for suggesting a coupon search. My new doctor told me the newest generation of the anticoagulants and a combination blood pressure drug combo are the most expensive in their class. He wanted me to start something 2 weeks ago. Since then, I spent a few days doing online research on drug trials for what he'd initially written and I'd compiled a booklet about them, their side effects, and relative efficacy against adverse events such as sudden cardiac death and stroke (which I've seen up close, as my father and one brother both died of strokes)

So today I gave him my first choices of a couple of different categories for him to decide which to start me with. At this stage I just have to buy something. He still wants a cardiologist involved. And the doctor didn't answer my question about the expensive anticoagulant's "black box warning" that once a patient starts on it, if the patient stops taking it, their risk of stroke goes up (over what it was before starting the drug)!! What do people do if they run out or have to have surgery, I asked him. All he said was "Right now, nobody would perform surgery on you."

Shehawk, here is an example of taking care of ourselves....if I have to fork over the big bucks to protect my body from bad medicines, so be it. Scary to trust a new doctor one doesn't know. Thinking of you.

The cheap anti-coagulant is pretty scary, too.

I don't see much point in combining 2 generic meds into one pill and calling it new so Big Pharma can charge high prices for same-old-same-old. Am I missing something?

Sisoon said:

At some point in the distant past I read or heard that it takes time for someone to really hear a speaker, so it's good to start with some throwaway words/phrases.

This is good advice and reminded me of when our daughter was a teenager. At the dinner table, she used to start a conversation in the middle and without any warning. It was the double whammy. We weren’t primed to listen and we had to wait until she got around to telling us what the subject was. Then she’d get frustrated that no one understood her point. I know she got tired of me asking if she’d ever heard of a topic sentence. Eventually hit on the idea of giving her a version of the platform academic training the Air Force forced on junior officers. Just start with, "I want to talk about x…." The rest comes natural and everyone is on notice as to what is coming. (We were also told to give smoke breaks after 50 minutes of classroom instruction, but I’m sure those days are long gone.)

I have been taken to task for starting a conversation as above. My wife sometimes will take offense when I start by stating the obvious, like I might say, "Bread prices have gone sky high" with the intent to discuss the effect of the Russian invasion of Ukraine on world grain and energy prices. She will stop me and say, "Do you really think I don’t know that bread has gone up?" Which brings me to my final point. We would all be better off if we gave each other the benefit of the doubt. Most of the time, as Freud said, a cigar is just a cigar. And most of the time we just didn’t hear what the spouse said.

Superesse, it occurred to me that it may not be a lack of respect. It may be a surplus of comfortability. We treat acquaintances with more forbearance than we do those we know the best, like family and close friends. But it wouldn’t hurt to afford to loved ones some of what we give so freely to those who are not our near and dears.

Sisoon, thanks to you, I am getting one of my new generics filled tonight via a coupon you suggested that I search for. I already showed it to the pharmacist and it will be honored, saving me $450.00 for a 90 day supply!! Didn't even have to sign up for it!!! The other drug is so new there isn't yet a generic for it, but it is an older angiotensin receptor blocker packaged with a new class of drug that not only helps reduce sodium but can remove amyloid beta from spinal fluid, possibly preventing Alzheimers. I'm in favor of any drug that has multiple benefits like that! But we shall see. I cannot pay for it, even with the Medicare drug plan I'm on, and I understand obtaining it from Canada is a possible option but I have to be careful to get a legit online seller.

Notsogreatexpectations, I smiled with your example of a general truth you started with and your wife's response, sounds familiar.... By any chance do you speak these comments out loud from your newspaper or tablet while sitting in your recliner as she is in the kitchen rustling up dinner? THAT happens here...and I cannot attend to much else while I'm struggling to cook! H copied his father in his nightly newspaper-reading "addiction" (Newspapers offer more visual and tactile stimuli for his brain to absorb). But yes, often the context is lost with some of these over-simplified sentences we throw out, especially from another room.

I like the suggestion of crafting three word sentences, except he tends to react to so many things I say as if I am issuing a command, not just sharing in general. So shortening up what I say to him will probably reinforce that idea he has! In the example from yesterday, there was an embedded request "(Please) turn on my laptop..." followed by my qualifier as to why I was asking. I suspect all he heard in his head was "Do it." Knee jerk reacting, without processing. Is that a military thing? 🙂 He loved your comment about Air Force guys being oriented to problem solve. I loved the part about "sharing the journey," as I need to feel he is on board.

My husband has had hearing loss for years, plus tinnitus ringing in the ears. He frustrates me to no end saying "What- I can’t hear you" at nearly every conversation. Totally refuses hearing aids. I have lengthy conversations directed at him only to have him say "did you say something". Or he will accuse me of ignoring him when I have responded to his questions, he just never heard the response. I admit I don’t talk very loud but everyone else has no problem hearing me. On the flip side I have spent many evenings calling him every name in the book under my breath just to make myself feel better. He never heard that either.

Concerning the anti-coagulants, he is on them as well for an irregular heartbeat. He has a colonoscopy scheduled for next week. The doctor has spoken to him and authorized stopping it a few days before the procedure. This is standard for surgeries and procedures but must be okayed by your doctor. Also make sure you keep a first aid kit handy as minor cuts can bleed quite a bit, no matter how small. It’s a bit unnerving.

"Shehawk, here is an example of taking care of ourselves....if I have to fork over the big bucks to protect my body from bad medicines, so be it. Scary to trust a new doctor one doesn't know. Thinking of you"

Thanks Superesse

I had meant to type this earlier, but had a busy day today so sorry for a bit of a delay..
I do hope you will be able to find a medication that is best for you and a way to get it affordably.

It’s easier to explain the process knowing the exact medication medication (not asking you to share this sort of personal information on the forum)

But….i have helped a few people look into options to help with medication costs

Recently I helped a friend find a copay assistance (not dependent on patient being low income) from a particular drug company for a new diabetes medicine. If I remember right the cost dropped from around $250 to maybe $50 a month after I found the program for them and they filled out a pretty simple online application.

Some copay assist programs do work with Medicare. The friend I helped had commercial insurance from work.

I also purchase a medication I take that is not on my insurance’s approved list (formulary) direct to consumer from the drug company through a licensed pharmacy that mails it to me. The cost is around $25 cash price a month as compared with maybe $200 a month.

There are also ways to check to see what the cost of a medication would be before purchasing if you know the name of the medication and dose
If it is not covered by Medicare.

There is a list in people’s insurance documents that tells what class a medication in terms of copayment and the cost of that "tier"

The customer service people at least at the Medicare advantage plan have looked this up for me before

I have also used various searches to compare the cost of a drug is not covered including good rx and going to Sam’s club and seeing what it is with their top membership level as well as I even checked Amazon pharmacy and called my insurance company’s online pharmacy.
I don’t know anything about Amazon personally and have never used them.

I have found costs varied considerably for a medication I needed and take that is non formulary (basically I have to pay for it completely).

I imagine if you specifically asked the question about affording medication in the US on this forum you might get some more suggestions.

Sometimes there are departments and professionals like medical social workers who can help with this as well. It is difficult enough being sick so it’s even harder with the out of this world pricing of some of the newer medications.

A pharmacist has always been helpful to me in the past too. It used to be that they could not tell you if the insurance or the cash price of a medication is less. But lately the pharmacist told
me that something I needed was cheaper cash than running it through the insurance….

And sorry for the typos. My screen has been acting posessed lately and it’s late here.

I’m a speech pathologist.

I know a bit about people who only hear parts of what you say.

A few things are likely happening with the spouse who doesn’t "hear" everything.

1. He likely has established a listening "pattern" in his mind for you. What I mean is that when two people have a very high frequency of interaction with one another, they begin to believe they sort of already know what the other one is going to say, how they will say it, and they do not completely listen to what the other one says. You will see this with young teen females, as one example - they will talk and finish each other’s sentences, or sometimes not even finish sentences at all and just laugh knowingly. You may do this with close friends or siblings. This occurs because of closeness, but can be the source of problems with people because the very closeness that makes for "unspoken" or "quick" communication can lead to really poor communication in situations where the message is not routine or is misread.

2. When it comes to complex sentences like you’re talking about, where you have a command and then you offer more information or further instructions, your idea of breaking it down isn’t bad. But it might help to break it down a little differently. Offer the "what I already did" information first - not last - because it sounds like that’s where his head goes. I would phrase it like this "I did about SIX THINGS ALREADY, including x, y, z, and more. I am not looking for more solutions, though."

Then, let him go on, because he will offer solutions. Maybe one will be good, yay! But you have to wait. I will offer tips on that, too.

But when he’s done "solving" this for you, then you say, "Thanks. I need to ask TWO (or however many) things of you." Then state them. "First turn on computer, second look up x, y, z."

Stating the NUMBER of things you’re about to need will change the "listen to the end of my sentence" part of their listening approach. It’s a game changer. Use it. Use it at work, with kids, with anyone. Game changer in meetings, too.

3. Use your silence in conversations to your advantage. This is more powerful to get him to listen than you can possibly comprehend. It will also get the listener to talk, and open up, and CONCEDE more than you can imagine.

Yes, silence.

When we have a conversation, there’s a natural pace of back and forth. With extremely short (millisecond) pauses in between your turn and mine.

But you hold the power to alter those pauses, and the fact is that those pauses can be extremely useful. Let’s say you are talking about a difficult topic and you want the other person to admit more, or open up more. Ordinarily you would talk back and forth and you would verbally ask questions, request more information, to draw them out.

Instead of doing that, ask your question, and wait. Just silently let them respond. When they finish answering, nod your head in understanding. You might make a sound like "hmmmm". That’s it. Look at them with an accepting expression or neutral expression, but silence, nothing verbal.

Now this will be the most uncomfortable 10 to 15 seconds of your life, and you are going to want to say something. Don’t. Your job is to wait it out, nod, look like you are thinking it over.

They WILL be trying to figure out why you aren’t talking. Don’t worry about that. Because they are about to fill that silence for you, and almost always they fill it with gold.

Almost always they offer more information, or a concession, or they offer to help you, or a more generous offer than before. They will back off of a previous statement that was harsh or mean. They will give details of what they were holding back, or will apologize. They will offer a solution to make something right that they resisted before.

Almost always - not always. Sometimes they say "what?" In which case you say, "just listening" and you sit a bit longer - and usually the gold comes then.

Yes, you do occasionally get the resistant one. But when you make this a practice, you win far more often than you lose. It’s very subtle, because people just don’t like that "silence", and some people break it after only 2-3 seconds, it’s amazing.

I got a $14,000 difference in salary offer using this. Just waited them out on the "best offer". Took about two rounds of "hmmm".

The trick is not talking yourself. Takes some practice.