vocal issues
I was talking to Mom last night on my cell when I got a phone call from work, so I grabbed the landline... when I got back to Mom she asked who was here. I was like, just me? She said she swore a friend of mine was here, sounded like her deeper voice, at least. I was like, no, that would have been me on the other phone! Then I told her it's funny, because once I left a message on my boyfriend's machine and when we both ended up there listening to it, and I heard myself, I looked at him and said, "Oh my God, I sound like a teenaged boy!" He said, "Yanno, I didn't wanna say anything, but yeah, you do."
Apparently my voice has been getting deeper than I thought. Makes sense to me, though, because for the past five or six months (sometime toward the beginning of fall and the change of seasons), my voice has been increasingly difficult to control and even cuts out on me at times, especially when I try to talk louder for someone who can't hear me (I'm notorious for having a soft voice). It's now to the point where I can't even change my voice into the weird ones I like to play with without having it become uncomfortable and sometimes cutting out. Gollum included. Ugh. I love to imitate Gollum...
So Mom heard all this and she gets nervous and says, "You should have that checked out or something, might be polyps!" I was like, "Nah, I'm just getting older, I'm almost thirty, my voice is just getting deeper I think." She's like, "Teenagers go through voice changes during puberty, not adults! You should have it checked out!" I still disagreed but of course she got me a bit nervous. So I began researching.
Polyps and nodules and cysts, no. I don't have a gravelly voice or anything like that. But the symptoms of vocal cord /lesions/ actually do sort of fit, and the cause is thought to be from straining one's voice - which I do frequently because people can't hear me otherwise. My problem is, some of these symptoms I've been dealing with most of my life and I didn't even know they were abnormal:
"A change in voice quality and persistent hoarseness are often the first warning signs of a vocal cord lesion. Other symptoms can include:
"Vocal fatigue (usually only when singing)
Unreliable voice (er, yeah)
Delayed voice initiation (this is why I "test" my voice before making phone calls, I've done this for a LONG time)
Low, gravelly voice (no)
Low pitch (getting lower)
Voice breaks in first passages of sentences (again, the "test")
Airy or breathy voice (no but it feels like a natural singing voice to me and puts less strain on the voice itself)
Inability to sing in high, soft voice (yeah, talk about harsh and loss of control, but I figured that was just because I can't sing well)
Increased effort to speak or sing (usually with other noise around, this seemed normal to me)
Hoarse and rough voice quality (no, but again, "testing" for hoarseness)
Frequent throat clearing (go through spells of this)
Extra force needed for voice (yep, again, thought this was normal for me though)
Voice "hard to find" (again, see "test", never realized others don't have this problem)
"When a vocal cord lesion is present, symptoms may increase or decrease in degree, but will persist and do not go away on their own."
This last one /could/ explain why it comes and goes in severity. BUT I've always thought milk had something to do with my voice - if I eat ice cream, my voice takes a nosedive into scratchiness, hoarseness, extra mucous, etc. Forget about trying to sing for a day or two afterward. If I drink a lot of milk, I get extra mucous and it makes my voice harder to control and I clear my throat more. I noticed last year that drinking water in place of everything else helped my singing voice get better, but the speaking thing still required the usual effort, or maybe it was just out of habit?
Anyway, I generally stay away from milk because it also hurts my stomach, and I /know/ I've not had it often for the whole five/six months since this has been more noticeable to me. A musician friend of mine at work had said it could just be the drier air, etc, but why aren't others having this problem, and why didn't it get better since I added a humidifier to my house, or when the weather got damp again?
Over the course of the last two years I've gone from feeling more comfy singing to Mariah Carey, Sarah McLachlan and Katie Holmes to being more comfy with Meredith Brooks, Savage Garden and Madonna, and now it's Peter Cetera's lower things, Billy Joel, and Dan Fogelburg. It's annoying, really, because I feel as if I just barely get really good at a few songs where I don't feel as self-conscious singing them in public and then my voice changes again and I can't control my voice in that range!! ARRRRRGHHHHH!!!!
Anyone else with this type of issue, and if so, any ideas on what causes it and how to fix it without going to see some crackpot who'll try to feed me chemicals and cause other problems? LOL
~nvnohi
Apparently my voice has been getting deeper than I thought. Makes sense to me, though, because for the past five or six months (sometime toward the beginning of fall and the change of seasons), my voice has been increasingly difficult to control and even cuts out on me at times, especially when I try to talk louder for someone who can't hear me (I'm notorious for having a soft voice). It's now to the point where I can't even change my voice into the weird ones I like to play with without having it become uncomfortable and sometimes cutting out. Gollum included. Ugh. I love to imitate Gollum...
So Mom heard all this and she gets nervous and says, "You should have that checked out or something, might be polyps!" I was like, "Nah, I'm just getting older, I'm almost thirty, my voice is just getting deeper I think." She's like, "Teenagers go through voice changes during puberty, not adults! You should have it checked out!" I still disagreed but of course she got me a bit nervous. So I began researching.
Polyps and nodules and cysts, no. I don't have a gravelly voice or anything like that. But the symptoms of vocal cord /lesions/ actually do sort of fit, and the cause is thought to be from straining one's voice - which I do frequently because people can't hear me otherwise. My problem is, some of these symptoms I've been dealing with most of my life and I didn't even know they were abnormal:
"A change in voice quality and persistent hoarseness are often the first warning signs of a vocal cord lesion. Other symptoms can include:
"Vocal fatigue (usually only when singing)
Unreliable voice (er, yeah)
Delayed voice initiation (this is why I "test" my voice before making phone calls, I've done this for a LONG time)
Low, gravelly voice (no)
Low pitch (getting lower)
Voice breaks in first passages of sentences (again, the "test")
Airy or breathy voice (no but it feels like a natural singing voice to me and puts less strain on the voice itself)
Inability to sing in high, soft voice (yeah, talk about harsh and loss of control, but I figured that was just because I can't sing well)
Increased effort to speak or sing (usually with other noise around, this seemed normal to me)
Hoarse and rough voice quality (no, but again, "testing" for hoarseness)
Frequent throat clearing (go through spells of this)
Extra force needed for voice (yep, again, thought this was normal for me though)
Voice "hard to find" (again, see "test", never realized others don't have this problem)
"When a vocal cord lesion is present, symptoms may increase or decrease in degree, but will persist and do not go away on their own."
This last one /could/ explain why it comes and goes in severity. BUT I've always thought milk had something to do with my voice - if I eat ice cream, my voice takes a nosedive into scratchiness, hoarseness, extra mucous, etc. Forget about trying to sing for a day or two afterward. If I drink a lot of milk, I get extra mucous and it makes my voice harder to control and I clear my throat more. I noticed last year that drinking water in place of everything else helped my singing voice get better, but the speaking thing still required the usual effort, or maybe it was just out of habit?
Anyway, I generally stay away from milk because it also hurts my stomach, and I /know/ I've not had it often for the whole five/six months since this has been more noticeable to me. A musician friend of mine at work had said it could just be the drier air, etc, but why aren't others having this problem, and why didn't it get better since I added a humidifier to my house, or when the weather got damp again?
Over the course of the last two years I've gone from feeling more comfy singing to Mariah Carey, Sarah McLachlan and Katie Holmes to being more comfy with Meredith Brooks, Savage Garden and Madonna, and now it's Peter Cetera's lower things, Billy Joel, and Dan Fogelburg. It's annoying, really, because I feel as if I just barely get really good at a few songs where I don't feel as self-conscious singing them in public and then my voice changes again and I can't control my voice in that range!! ARRRRRGHHHHH!!!!
Anyone else with this type of issue, and if so, any ideas on what causes it and how to fix it without going to see some crackpot who'll try to feed me chemicals and cause other problems? LOL
~nvnohi
