Hey, bud. I’m 21 M and just graduating university in May. I’ve been stuttering for as long as I could remember. I did speech therapy in elementary school, but after I got my syllables annunciated properly they cut me out of it. Looking back, I’m not too sure why since the stutter was very much present, but that’s beside the point. Unlike others in this post, I didn’t grow up with too much speech therapy. When I was your age I was incredibly insecure about the stutter to the point I would go mute all day through school until I was at home playing games and giving callouts like a boss. (Admittedly, I didn’t stutter too much over the headset though). At the end of high school I broke out of my shell a bit, but still had the stutter present in nearly all conversations. Especially presentations or when I was called on in class. It was embarrassing, but I slowly recognized that most people just don’t care too much. The ones that do either think it’s cute, or they’re just not worth the frustration put in to begin with. Fast forward to today, university was my chance to open up and try new things. I joined some groups/clubs/fraternities, committed to my studies, and did my best to try something new each week. I made tons of friends who have mentioned time and time again they’re impressed with how far my stutter has come. In the beginning of university I would stumble and stutter at the generic, “Say one thing about yourself and your name.” Introduction. I still still stumble at that one sometimes. Some folks asked me about it out of sheer curiosity while others didn’t pay any attention to it. One thing that nobody did though was make fun of it or mock me. Even in my oral presentation class my professor gave me an additional 3 minutes for each speech and nobody batted an eye. I kept eye contact, stuttered my way through my point, and wrapped up my discussion. Again, no one mocked me and some even went out of their way to congratulate me on things such as my eye contact and dedication or the way I didn’t show any physical frustration with myself. Those early experience at university helped me realize that the true world is nothing like higshchool. If you’re different for a sitter nobody will bat an eye. Some may even strike up a conversation with you because of it! Thanks to the confidence I gained from these experiences I’ve been able to secure a position in my dream career, graduate university, and have a strong support system all by 21. Much more than I ever thought possible at your age. I apologize if this post came off as boastful, I’m just hoping that sharing my experience can give you some insight on things. The stutter is hardly even a blip on people’s radar down the line. Make it past high school and everything will be alright. Keep your head up and just continue being yourself. You’ve got this. Feel free to DM me if you want to talk more about it, I’d happily share some more experiences!