Phone challenges

[Tara]

A couple of days ago, on a phone call a recruiter called me "ma'am". It's good to get those little wins with the challenge of the phone voice. Too bad the job would have been about a 30% pay cut.

Then today, another one was talking with me for a position that is much further along, and is probably going to happen, and is much better in pay. He knows my legal name as well as my name and pronoun preference. Unfortunately, in the low humidity, my voice was getting a bit dry and scratchy and slipping into a lower register. At one point, he said something like "That's absolutely right, sir! Oh, um, er, that's right, um." To his credit, he didn't fall all over himself apologising. And later, he said "we're looking forward to having you join us, ma'am."

Lesson learned: keep water at hand while talking on the phone on a winter's day!

Sometimes you're the fox, sometimes you're the faux. C'est la vie, et la vie est belle.

[julie.chan]

You know, funny thing about that. It's usually not water that helps me when I have issues with my voice, but food. That, of course, is annoying, so I'm trying to find other ways to help. Maybe sugar-free mints. That's probably the next thing I'm going to try.

How long have you been voice training? It gets easier over time. For me, getting my voice to sound feminine isn't the issue, it's more making sure I don't sound like I'm sick.

[Tara]

It does get easier over time. I've been working on my voice for six or seven years, mostly on my own, but some with a voice therapist by phone.

The biggest improvements I've made is work on rhythm and dynamics, including hings like raising my pitch a bit, using more pitch range, holding final syllables a bit longer. My voice is generally accepted as feminine in person, but on phone it's more like 50%, and only if I really focus on it. I used to sing baritone, but these days it's generally tenor or even alto. I sing along with altos like k.d. lang and Karen Carpenter in the car sometimes.

Funny, when I was at university, I had a speech instructor refer me to some speech therapy to reduce my lisp, as it tended to make me sound effeminate. Last year, the therapist I was working with had me work on redeveloping that slight lisp, to sound more feminine. So, I've been trying to reclaim my lotht lithp, without overdoing it.

I have found that Fisherman's Friend lozenges are good for the throat, without being loaded with sugar as so many mints and cough drops are. They have a licorice flavouring, though, and not everyone is fond of that.

[dreamin]

i absolutely fucking HATE the phone and drive-thru window intercoms. i also hate hearing the feedback coming from another person's speaker when i'm video chatting them, 'cause it simply sounds like a deep, throaty male radio show host's voice (even tho i'm relatively certain i don't sound as bad IRL). it all makes me wanna die, resurrect, just so i can die again ...repeat

[SophieCantDance]

I know exactly what you mean Dreamin; I compete on an Overwatch team. We record our practices, and watch them to find mistakes/way to improve our game. This means that I get to spend eight hours a week hearing my voice in a context where I am way to focused on other things to worry about my voice. It...is heartbreaking honestly.

[dreamin]

oossshhhhh really sorry to hear that Sophie... i guess for what it's worth it also provides a fertile testing ground for being able to try adjusting your voice upwards and seeing if you can hold it for some hours at a time

really cool you play competitive Overwatch btw :3

[Lesley Niyori]

Man, I hate my voice.

Granted, it's not without funny moments.

Walking alone at night, if I should need to be, and if I were to find myself in a dangerous situation with a potential assailant, well, I'm sure I could get them right totally off guard with a sudden dose of threatening military grade verbal exchange while I manage to make my escape

I tend to tell anyone that calls me and then later asks me "who was that on the phone?" I reply with "that was my father."

It is also handy when you want to not deal with collection agencies etc. Me "Hello?" Them "Is Lesley there?" Me "Who wants to know?" Them "We need to speak with her" Me "She's not here currently, what is this concerning?" Them "We need to speak to her only" Me "good luck with that".

But, yeah, it sucks for instance when trying to make YouTube videos like I do.

It's a pain on dates, especially when the doofus looked at your picture(s), not your profile, and managed to arrange a date without ever discovering you are transgender.

I've lost count of how many times a guy on a dating site has made it through the intro, chatting and asking for a phone number, and yet when they say hello, usually in badly accented lousy excuse English, they get confused by my voice and hang up. Are dating scammers really that fucking dumb? Do they truly not read any of the profile?

[dreamin]

Are dating scammers really that fucking dumb? Do they truly not read any of the profile?

those who 'ghost' are largely not scammers and are instead just selfish assholes who don't invest a single nanosecond more into trying to build something with a person who doesn't perfectly meet all their criteria

but yeah guys don't seem to read profiles very much unless you prompt them to do so up-front, and my feeling is that most have cock in hand and gauge whether or not to msg you based on how fappable your pix are ...so i'd suggest to not overdo it w/ the sexiness on those and make them work for it by requiring actual communication with you first

[SophieCantDance]

A friend of mine received a response from someone on a dating site that was "Hit the gym, and I would fuck you."

eww, I mean, just, eww. There is no world where treating someone that way is acceptable.

Another friend of mine met a girl through one of these services, slept with her, then told me that he would not call her back because "...[he] would never date a girl who fucks on the first date." Needless to say, I do not talk to that person anymore.

And that is just with cis gendered people. I cannot even imagine the scum you are likely to meet as a transgendered person partaking in online dating.

Either way, I have way too many privacy issues to ever do something like that ;p

[dreamin]

Either way, I have way too many privacy issues to ever do something like that ;p

you can get images & text out there enough on your profile to convey the essence of you without giving them the "full art glossy HD" version of you up front ...until you're comfy enough with them to do so. that way it's at least more private than being picked up at a bar or club

...but yeah one must be pretty careful to maintain the actual level of privacy they imagine themselves to have online

[CeliaEriksson]

It can be pretty creepy. I tried and it either starts with an 'ewww' thing straight away or it starts with niceties but soon gets down to sex with most of them. There probably are nice guys on these sites and one I in particular seemed very nice, but I just did not like him enough, the most important thing in the equation after all.

It took quite some nerve going on there for me and I was very worried about it all as I know there are lots of bad people out there.... I quit after three weeks of receiving suggestions similar to the gym one given above.

[Lesley Niyori]

Hmm, I get guys calling me beautiful and gorgeous and mentioning my wonderful smile and really, I've not got any history of nasty comments actually.

They want to chat, but, when it comes to actually arranging a date it's like me asking them "why exactly are you on a dating site?"

[CeliaEriksson]

Oh Lesley, the 'ewww' thing is not any of the men being nasty to me, it's them coming out with what they would like to do to me. It's me doing the ewwwing....

[Lesley Niyori]

Oh Lesley, the 'ewww' thing is not some of the men being nasty to me, it's them coming out with what they would like to do to me. It's me doing the ewwwing....

That's still kinda vague.

I just got off the phone not more than an hour ago, with a potential date, and for once, the call started good and progressed to great and not once was my voice an issue. He seemed pretty aware I was transgender.

I have a date planned for 10 on this Sunday. It might be the moment I have dreamed of. Who knows eh. I waited for 3 years thinking the surgery would never happen too. But it did, finally.

[Kim 0]

After a lot of practice, I don't usually get misgendered on the phone. However, people are always (politely) asking me if I'm feeling okay or saying stuff like "I hope you get well soon, Ma'am" etc.

I guess I just sound like a woman with a really bad cold.

[Ashley@Heart]

I think I am slowly getting better, it is hardly conscious anymore, except when I need to annunciate as my desire to make the sound louder sometimes causes me to use old habits in forming the words. I can tell I confuse people sometimes as when they call me asking for my old name I can hear the mental gears shifting in their heads. *shrug*

As to helping lemon ginger tea with lots of honey and lemon juice.. can calm my throat on a bad day.

[dreamin]

As to helping lemon ginger tea with lots of honey and lemon juice.. can calm my throat on a bad day.

there are only a couple of extra ingredients needed to add to this^ specific concoction in order to make my otherworldly ambrosia-manna witches brew you change after partaking of it... just think about how closely you're skirting the edge of altering your very being when you calm your throat next time c;

[Ashley@Heart]

there are only a couple of extra ingredients needed to add to this^ specific concoction in order to make my otherworldly ambrosia-manna witches brew you change after partaking of it... just think about how closely you're skirting the edge of altering your very being when you calm your throat next time c;

Hahaha.. don't get me started on tea.. there is a little tea shop about 20 minutes away from me. That has the most divine estate grown jasmine and white tea pearls. And their spiced cinnamon herbal tea just warms the soul. I might not care for coffee but serve me some of that and I will purr like a kitten. As for the honey so far the local raw huckleberry honey is my favorite.

[dreamin]

Hahaha.. don't get me started on tea.. there is a little tea shop about 20 minutes away from me. That has the most divine estate grown jasmine and white tea pearls. And their spiced cinnamon herbal tea just warms the soul. I might not care for coffee but serve me some of that and I will purr like a kitten. As for the honey so far the local raw huckleberry honey is my favorite.

mmmm sounds super-yummy, let's go girl