No stuttering incidents since last year; Stutterer of 6 years

No stuttering incidents since last year; Stutterer of 6 years This is my first post on this subreddit, and I think it's actually my first time checking out this subreddit. I made an account just for this post (and possibly more to followup) because I care deeply about helping fellow stutterers and wanted to share the techniques/mindset I used to not have any stuttering relapses in over a year. Whether this could be called a "cure" is up for interpretation, and I certainly will not debate this with the mods or anyone else for fear of getting banned/censored from this subreddit. Everyone has their own degree of severity and unique problem with stuttering, and whatever I'm describing helped for my particular situation--I'm in no way touting that this will work for everyone. This could potentially be a very lengthy post, as I want to really go into detail about what worked for me. **Background** First, a little bit about me. I started stuttering when I was 12, when I was ordering a sandwich and just couldn't spit out the "t" sound in tomato. Soon after, I began "blocking" on several other letters, including k, p, d, b, a, o, and pretty much 3/4 of the alphabet. However, I didn't want my stuttering problem to be obvious for fear of being seen as a "handicap" or "disabled," so rather than audibly stuttering through the beginning of words, my brain trained itself to not be able to even utter the word, as attempting to get a sound out will reveal the stutter. This is known as "blocking," and I'm sure other people struggle with this as well (blocking is still considered to be stuttering). As you can imagine, this created many awkward moments where people asked me my name, and I would gaze terrifyingly at them in silence trying to emit the sound of the first letter in my name. I tried using various tricks throughout the years to get the first letter out, as once I got past the first letter of the word, it was always smooth sailing with no stuttering for the rest of the word. I tried leaning forward to put my momentum into the word, I tried pretending that I couldn't hear what they were saying to buy time for me to get the word out, and various other temporary, quick fixes (none of which would work permanently). School was terrifying, especially when you're asked to read aloud because you can't use any substitute words for words you know you'll stutter on. Oh man, you wouldn't believe the sigh of relief I felt when I wasn't called on. However, please note that I wasn't the worst stutterer, I was barely living on the edge of covert/overt stuttering, where people could sense something was odd but weren't sure exactly what was going on. Fast forward to when I was 18, I got into MIT (despite having an awkward interview doing my best to use the weird techniques above), and I was both ecstatic and terrified, terrified that I won't be able to do well in classes where I have to speak up, make friends, or introduce myself to professors asking them if I can participate in research. What's the point in paying so much tuition to not partake in any of these things? I had to stop stuttering and fast. **Techniques/Mindsets that Got Me Speaking Like A Normal Person Again: Stage I** These techniques that I used helped in the beginning of my mission to confront stuttering and slowly eliminate it day by day. Keep in mind these are for people who only stutter at the beginning of words. * Insert words you know you can say at any time in front of problem words. Here is an example: * You want to say "Gardening is not a hobby of mine," but you get stuck on the "G" in gardening. You can instead say, "So\[gardening\] is not a hobby of mine," literally linking two words, "So" and "gardening" into one word with no space or break in between. If you train your mind to think of this as one long word, and you don't have any trouble stuttering with "S" in "so," you will be able to say it fluently and naturally using no special breathing or any other techniques. Alternatives can be, "Appartently\[gardening\] is not a hobby of mine" or "Uhhhh\[gardening\] is not a hobby of mine." Literally any usable "starting phrase" works. * When saying a sentence, try to do your best to just link all of the words together. This could come off as slurring your words, but you can avoid stuttering by not pausing when saying multiple words at a time, keeping your voice "on" the entire time. You can do this by extending the ending of the words that precede the problem word. Here is an example: * You want to say "I really love apple juice," but you stutter on the "a" in apple. You can instead say "I really lovvvvv\[apple\] juice," not pausing and basically combining the two words into one. * Speak **SLOWER**. Where are you rushing? To stutter? Please take your time with doing the above techniques, if you try it and still feel a stutter coming: 1. Pause, stop talking. 2. Go back to the beginning, focusing on linking the words or putting substitute words in front of the problem words and linking them together into one long word. 3. Try again. 4. If you again feel a stutter, repeat steps 1-3. You can practice this on your own or with anyone. What you're doing is retraining the way your brain approaches stuttering, and instead saying something stutter free. Over time (several weeks to months) you will notice speaking becomes much easier. **Techniques/Mindsets that Got Me Speaking Like A Normal Person Again: Stage II** If you're doing the techniques in Stage II, you should physically not be able to stutter, as you shouldn't speak if you feel a stutter incoming. After some time, you should have way less anxiety, as you can literally speak without thinking about the techniques, it will just happen automatically. Thus, I finally speak like a normal person. **Concluding Thoughts/Important Points** I'm typing this late at night, I'm tired and probably left out some information (which I can edit for later upon request). The last thing I'll say is that I've seen many stutterers using breathing techniques to help, and I do not recommend these at all, as you can breathe normally (try talking just to yourself, your body automatically controls your breathing so you do not have to think about it). Breathing shouldn't be a conscious thought. Also, any jerking/clenching body movements are completely unnecessary. I also personally believe that stuttering is mostly a psychological disorder induced by the constant cycle of anxiety and stuttering memories, which build on another to worsen the situation. Breaking the chain breaks the stuttering, at least for me. EDIT: Some people have said that putting certain words in front of the problem words eventually leads to stuttering on those other words. The trick here is to consistently vary the starting phrase and focus on LINKAGE, not on WORDS. Just the concept of linkage in your head will bypass the stuttering brain's tendency to hyperfocus on words and subsequently stutter on them.