commentr/StutterAugust 8, 2020

Content

I did speech therapy as a kid and felt like nothing worked but then did it again at age 20/21 and found some real tricks and techniques that work. Honestly, the thing that works the best for me is openness about it, telling people I have a stutter takes the pressure off me to be perfect and them to know how to react. I'm just finishing my teaching degree and I tell all my classes both at the university and at the elementary school about it , sort of as a heads up. As for techniques, smooth starts are helpful which is what others have mentioned on this post. It just means when you're trying to say a word or start a phrase, you kinda start quietly and purposely say the first sound longer and smoother. Like I always struggle with "Hello" so I would say the H sound starting quiet and extend it a bit like Hhhhello. Hard to explain without sound but a good technique to practice. In addition, blending works well for me especially when I am reading out loud or speaking to the class for longer chunks. Blending takes a bit of practice as at first sounds very odd because you literally just speak slowly blending all the words together, but with practice it can sound very normal. Nothing works perfectly for me, and I still stutter fairly often but these are the things that have helped for me!

Themes

Therapy & ProfessionalSocial & RelationshipsCoping & Advocacy

Subthemes

Therapy ExperiencesDisclosure & Telling OthersFluency Techniques