Why is it so hard to say the words that are in your head?

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Sometimes when I'm talking to someone I have something I want to say but I can't make myself say the words. It's like I'm screaming it in my head but my lips won't move. I sometimes think that if I stare at them they will somehow know what I want to say and it will all be better. Never happens though. Do any of you do the same thing and how do you handle it? ANy advice would be appreciated.

i mainly can not be bothered to say what i am thinking unless someone asks me.
the world is full of gabble, and my gabble stays in my mind unless it is sought by inquiry.

Yes,
It's like I wait and wait for myself to say something but nothing comes out. Or I repeat it over and over and nothing comes out. Or I know what I want to say but... the words just seem to not be there. Or, the words that are actually there just move by more quickly than I can decide to say them.

I don't know why it's so hard. In my case, anxiety? Low self esteem? Some low degree of autism? It feels too emotionally intense sometimes to speak? I'm sometimes too afraid of judgement or that I'm wrong, but that's only the case sometimes. Hearing myself speak some things out loud doesn't sound exactly like what's in my head and it feels upsetting somehow to hear? I'm so non-social and alone lately that my brain isn't used to speaking out loud to people the way it should be used to it? I focus/obsess too much on my thoughts and can't break away from that to speak? I'm so used to not responding that it seems more natural to just not say anything than to respond when someone is waiting for a response?

I know exactly what you mean. Like when my husband asks me something like what I'm looking for in the store, or what quest I'm doing in Warcraft... I know I'm looking for Clorox 2 or that I'm trying to kill 12 raptors, but I can't for the life of me say it. After a long pause I'll snap "Stuff!" or "Killing things!" and he asks why I am upset. Finally I had to explain to him that I wasn't mad at him, that it pisses me off that trying to say things sometimes feels like passing a mental kidneystone. He's learned that if he stops asking, in a minute I'll be able to say "I'm looking for Clorox 2 so I can get the stain out of my work shirt" or "Trying to kill 12 or these raptors for the hunter back at the camp." Anyone have any suggestions that might help with that? Or at least how much it pisses me off?

I do that as well, but I don't have any methods to deal with it. I wish I did; it's one of the few things that actually makes me feel like I'm disabled simply because I'm non-neurotypical. I'd like to change it, but I just don't know how.

I can sometimes have difficulty with getting what I'm trying to say out of my head and into the atmosphere. It can vary between getting a little bit tongue-tied, to actually blurting something out and making absolutely no sense. The latter usually comes out when I'm in class, and trying to explain something kind of complicated. I usually have to stop and think about it for a little while.

yeah, I do that too. Just say something random that generally has nothing to do with the question asked. Makes me look like a nut at work or out somewhere.

I have big problems with this. It's one of the main things that makes me feel isolated from others. When around others who are having a conversation, I have trouble saying what I'm thinking. Another part of the issue is that it seems to take me longer to figure out what I would want to say in the first place. Usually when I finally know what I want to contribute to the conversation, the subject has changed.

I do this, too! It's so frustrating. Very often I know very clearly exactly what I am doing and can do it efficiently but I can't explain what I'm doing. I attribute it to the fact that I think I understand things visually. It's not that I necessarily see a picture but when something makes sense to me it's like I have a picture of the idea. I can't quite explain it. It's made me look like an utter idiot to my boss before. He's come up and asked me what I'm doing and I have a very clear well-defined idea of what I'm doing but very little of the definition will be in words. I won't even have thought to put words to it so when I'm asked what if I understand what I'm doing and I say yes, when I try to explain I look like a liar. "I'm putting these things on the thing after I ... and I'm ...uh...." Yeah.

This also happens to impair me in other ways, as well. For example, I tried to tell my mom a story involving air fresheners but I couldn't remember the words "air fresheners" so I said, "Uh, those fume-y things... the things for the mitigation of fumes... air fresheners!!" Why I could think of the word mitigation and not the simple word air freshener, I don't know, but it happens to me frequently.

My "coping" method for this is not a very good one: speaking VERY quickly to get out what I want to say before I "forget" or just "can't" get the words out.

Not something I would recommend--reactions from people around me are just as unfavorable.

I usually don't have a problem saying the words if I have the words in my head. I have a differnet problem of not having the words in my head to say, so I have to laboriously find the words and put them together when I want to say things that are moar complicated than "I'm going to the bathroom".

I have this problem, like I know what what I want to say but as soon as I want to say it I forget what I wanted to say, or it comes out all wrong. like I know what I want to say in my mind but it all comes out wrong.

I think I can relate. In my case I cannot seem to be able to formulate words and accompany them with tone in an effective way. I usually sound complainy or bored or overly disinterested. My problem is putting sentences in an order that will convey what I WANT effectively and thus I end up annoying people a great deal I am most comfortable talking about something than WITH someone.

To me a conversation is an exchange of data, otherwise it is not only difficult but it feels pointless. This makes keeping a conversation going pointless. If I am not interested in YOUR data, it is hard for me to hide it, or give it an ear, so to speak.