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I just feel lost I recently turned 17 and I just feel lost. I don’t really know how to say it but I don’t really know what to do. I started school again for the year a few weeks ago now and we have to wear masks while at school, which I’m completely fine with, but they make it so much more difficult to speak for me. Plus the fact that I also have these tics that I do (possibly Tourette’s but not officially diagnosed) and they are also a lot more frequent with the masks. It just making school so much more difficult and I can’t speak. Pretty much every time I’ve been called on to answer which happens almost every day now, I stutter so much and I block so hard and it’s awful. I had to read a part for a scene of a Shakespeare play we are studying and I stuttered so much on every single line I did and it was so embarrassing. There was even a time I had to answer a question with one word and it took me about 20-30 seconds. One word. I hate it so much. The most annoying one though was when a teacher asked me to answer and I did but I blocked, again, and he just moved on to the next question mid-block. I just kind of stopped when I saw that and no one noticed. It’s not just in school either. My stutter is probably at the worst it has ever been with both the lockdown and the return to school. I don’t know why the return to school had such a big affect of me but ever since it has been so bad. I play games and talk to my friends through the phone all the time and there has been a couple of times that they have asked me if I was even still there cause I blocked so hard. One time someone who I’m not as good friends with said that I was breaking up so much but I wasn’t it was just me. Ever since I turned 17 I just feel like I should have gotten over it by now. I feel like the older I get, the more I’d be expected to just get over it and I’m really nervous for the future. One of my biggest passions is the Irish language. I’m Irish myself and I love the language and when I’m older I would love to become an Irish teacher. I love teaching people the language and I would love to do it as a job, but whenever I speak the language I stutter so, so much and it kills me that I might not be able to do it because of my stutter. Like, how am I supposed to teach a class of 20-30 teenagers a language when I can’t even say the words I’m trying to teach them? I’m sorry if this is all over the place I just wanted to get that out. Thanks for reading