| ign="center"> | | | | times talk quite well. I could not understand why I |
| Are you one of the many people who suffer with | | | | was able to talk to person A but not person B. |
| the speech impediment known as stuttering or | | | | This caused me many frustrations. |
| stammering? Does your stutter/stammer cause | | | | When I was about sixteen, I started to drink |
| you to become very frustrated at times? Have | | | | alcohol. This had a major impact on my speech as |
| you attended speech therapy in the past in the | | | | I could talk perfectly well when I was drunk. This |
| hope that it would help improve your speech? I | | | | proved to me that there must be a chance of |
| am a person who has overcome a stutter and I | | | | me being able to overcome the stutter. |
| now help other people to achieve fluency. In this | | | | Speech therapists and negative national |
| article, I write about the frustrations and emotions | | | | associations, have for years attempted to |
| that people who stutter have to deal with. | | | | convince me to accept my stutter and have told |
| When I had a stutter, it created many different | | | | me that there is no cure for stuttering. How can |
| forms of emotions within me. I was actually | | | | this be right, if I was permanently drunk, I would |
| ashamed of having this speech impediment and | | | | be fluent, there is a cure in itself. Of course it is |
| did not want to discuss the problem with | | | | not right or healthy to be permanently drunk but I |
| anybody. My family, especially my parents, even | | | | am sure you know what I mean. |
| to this day are unaware of most of the difficulties | | | | I found certain tasks very hard to accomplish |
| that stuttering caused me, during my time at | | | | when I had the stutter. Making and answering |
| school and in my late teens. Even when I had a | | | | telephone calls was especially hard for me. I look |
| really bad day at school, I would not talk about | | | | back now and can not believe that I coped with |
| what had happened with my parents. I would | | | | working in an office environment for six years, at |
| instead just go to my bedroom and attempt to | | | | a time when I had the stutter. I remember |
| forget it. | | | | travelling to work feeling sick in my stomach |
| I also felt quite sorry for myself. I always | | | | through the stress and fear. |
| believed that I was a decent person and did not | | | | Ordering drinks and food at the bar, introducing |
| think that I deserved to have this horrible stutter. | | | | people to each other, attending meetings and job |
| There were many people in my class who in my | | | | interviews were other aspects of my life which |
| opinion deserved to have the stutter much more | | | | were made all that more harder by my inability to |
| than I did, however in truth I would not wish a | | | | talk fluently. |
| stutter on anybody. | | | | My advice to people who have a stuttering |
| Having a stutter made me feel less of a person | | | | problem is to not give up, believe in yourself and |
| than that of what I considered to be normal | | | | your own ability to one day achieve fluency. Do |
| people. I was not able to socialise with the ease | | | | not listen to negative people who try to convince |
| as what everybody else seemed to, and had | | | | you that there is no cure for stuttering. Most of |
| many traumatic experiences in the classroom | | | | the people who say this to you will have never |
| when attempting to read out of a book for | | | | had a stutter and will have no idea how our brains |
| example. | | | | work. |
| Even though I had a stuttering problem, I could at | | | | |