How many times is too much?

Good decision. But not a bad thing to post. I suspect every writer has a first-draft fetish or three of this sort, that simply need to be expunged. I know I do. I keep a running list of things like this to look for when I edit. My biggest bugaboo is the use of "some", either by itself or as a prefix. But I have others, too.

caw

Agree with blacbird that this is a good decision. Don't let your speech pattern interfere with your characters'.
Also what we take as normal might be construed by others (agents and editors) as wrong. Whatever the scenario, I've found that we overuse words based on our own idiosyncrasies.

I think there can be a couple of different kind of these phrases or words. There's the seemingly innocuous ones, rather plain, boring everyday phrases people use when speaking, like your "or something." It's very easy to unconsciously put a large number of those in. They aren't noticable except in the reptition, and even then a reader may not be aware of that particular phrase, just that the prose feels flat and samey.

On the other hand there are unusual words or turns of phrase which the writer may fall in love with and use more than once, but which really they should only use once in the whole book, or indeed once in their whole writing career! They're ususual enough to stick in the reader's mind in a good way the first time - arruming they are effective - but that means if they show up a second time in the story the reader immediately notices the repeat, which may make them think the writer is being lazy.

A good editor will pick out both of these problems of course!

missesdash said:

I've used all of the highlighting software and all, but now I realize I don't know when a phrase is "overused"

for example, I have the phrase "or something" 45 times out of 83,000 words. My characters are all teenagers and so is my narrator, so it feels natural.

It seems like a high number, but now when I consider how big the manuscript is.

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I don't think you can go by numbers. You have to go by feel. It might be hard for you to judge because you're so close to the writing. This is where it helps to get someone else's opinion (but don't draw it to their attention beforehand or you'll make them conscious of it from the start).

missesdash said:

actually, I jumped the gun with this question. Every time I use it, it adds nothing to the dialogue, so I'm going to go ahead and cut them. Sorry for wasting space!

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That's fair enough. Consider, though, it might be a good marker if it's used for just one character, to aid the reader in differentiating between characters.

missesdash said:

actually, I jumped the gun with this question. Every time I use it, it adds nothing to the dialogue, so I'm going to go ahead and cut them. Sorry for wasting space!

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I don't think they are supposed to add anything to the dialogue except verisimilitude. I would consider leaving some of them.

Don't cut all of them. Use that phrase as an identifier for one or two speakers in dialogue. Each character should have a signature way of speaking.

Yeah, I'd join in on saying they would be fine when used sparingly in dialogue. For example the word "just" is often considered a junk word, but I use it dialogue whenever it seems appropriate, i.e. "Just kidding." Yes I could delete that down to "Kidding" but it seems like overkill.

I think the place to closely watch those kinds of repetitions is in the narrative.