Yea, I think about this sometimes. You think that your authentic self is covered or has been warped due to having a severe speech impediment. And you keep imagining a world where you aren't shackled by your speech. Yea I understand. I will say that although stuttering can get in the way of something in life, it doesn't account for everything bad or every lost opportunity. Even if you didn't stutter, you'd still have the same fatal flaw in your character. You'd still have other short comings in you character that you can either neglect or fix. For example, things like poor work ethic, dishonesty, can't manage money, being too prideful and lacking courage. These are things that people can struggle all their life because they choose to ignore them rather than spend time plugging the holes in their character. Leading to people also missing opportunities and living less than optimal lives. I think that stuttering can be distracting or be used as an exuse to not fix the other problems in life. I know that stuttering can lead to us being drained spiritual or emotional burned out, so much so that we don't have the will to face these other huge obstacles in life. But we still need to work fix the problems that have a solution.