what is it like to be non verbal?

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I love South Park but I must have missed that one.

Germans have a reputation for telling unfunny jokes.

Here is a link to a relevant clip: LINK

Thanks Norny.

Practically speaking, what is the difference between someone who is nonverbal and someone with autism spectrum disorder who is selectively mute?

non verbal is a term that is traditionaly & medicaly associated with the non verbalism of severe/profound autism; that is through lack of speech [whether cognitively, no language,oral motor failiure etc] with selective mutism [think its called elective now? ] people have the normal ability to speak but through specific situations theyre stopped from speaking;its a phobic/ fear response, a example of this is the guy on 'big bang theory' who can only speak to women when drunk,as elective mutism is strongly associated with social anxiety.

some fully verbal very introverted autists choose to not speak as its more comfortable for them,under medical/traditional defining they woud be neither elective mutist or non verbal autistic, they woud be defined under general mutism.

I knew the words but couldn't put it together, thank you KoR.

no problem waterfalls!

For me when I was a kid, it was as Norny's friend described.
There was no awareness of language for communication until after I started using language for communication.
I understood what people said to me, but there was no verbal or non-verbal response to them.
Since there was no instinct to communicate or awareness of communication, there was no frustration about not communicating either.
It wasn't missed.

Do you get frustrated now? Or are you able to communicate easily and efficiently?

I have Autism Spectrum Disorder (although I prefer the term Autism Spectrum Condition that my support worker uses) and I have had episodes of being non-verbal for a few days at a time. Most of the time I am only part-verbal.

Being non-verbal for me is having the words in my head, but my mouth and vocal cords fail to coordinate to produce the sound. I end up making coughing or sighing noises instead. It's hard to explain but it feels like I suppose what expressive aphasia would feel like. I can often recover by sleeping for 11+ hours in one go (which is what I normally do - take extra Olanzapine and knock myself out).

Being part-verbal is what I am all the time. I can form words and I can speak, but it is so exhausting that I often avoid talking unless it is absolutely essential. The huge effort I have to put in when I am forming sentence structures is phenomenal. No wonder I am in my own world a lot of the time.

Thanks for the detailed answer.
So my opening post is mostly correct.

Those who say Aspergers does not belong on the spectrum are just plain wrong in my opinion.

I don't think selective mutism is necessarily the same as social anxiety.
It is also caused by lack of social imagination, not being aware of yourself in a particular social context. not understanding the social context you are in, not knowing how to interact with people in that context, and not having enough social instinct or desire to interact.

I'm no longer purely nonverbal autistic, but still close to it. When I'm verbal it's mostly limited to single words or sounds like uh huh for yes. Part of it is autism and part of it is apraxia of speech and also selective mutism. I have dreams where I can speak fluently. I guess I don't get too frustrated over it because I'm so used to it and have made progress. It's speech therapy that makes me get really frustrated.

By the way, Ezra, Happy Birthday!

When I turned 14, I was 4 foot 11; by the time I was 15, I was 5 foot 2.

Thanks! I'm currently 5 feet 0 inches.

Happy birthday Ezra.