[On Reddit Mobile App, ignore formatting!] Hey, Hi! Recently jumped into my own speech therapy journey and wanted to offer some insights and advice! A bit of context, I work as a risk consultant who speaks to big-name clients at a high level a few times a weeks. A large part of my career is learning, testing computer networks, and report writing. Still, once or twice a week I speak at high profile meetings. I can confidently say, in my ~4 years in the field, I’ve only been ‘moderately fluent’ in one, maybe two, meetings. Both of which were in the last month. To say meetings were the source of my imposter syndrome and anxiety is an understatement, no matter how much I wanted to believe “the stutter isn’t from anxiety, it’s just my default”. SO! What’s the miracle cure to becoming a silver-tongued medical professional?? Simple, just don’t let your stutter bother you. That’s it. . . . Pretty anti-climactic, right? Okay, so that’s not actually “it”. Yes, the #1 ‘solution’ to not stutter is simply don’t let it bother you. But that’s not a satisfying answer. How TF are we supposed to just say, “You know what? I’m done letting this speech impediment control me. After 20+ years of my life, I’m finally ready to be ‘Normal’. You can’t. You can’t just turn it off one day. Truth is, your brain has been conditioned and wired to tense under pressure and anxiety. At some point we adopted the mindset of ‘I stutter, so I’m not perceived as equal.’ Just that thought alone would trigger anxiety in most people. An anxiety, as all of us here are familiar with, is a common root-cause of stuttering. Okay, fine. We’ve established my stuttering is onset by a history of stuttering. Which has caused me anxiety. Anxiety that led to more stuttering. Which has led my own brain to perceive myself as ‘different’, which spikes anxiety when I need to speak. Which, as we’ve established, causes even MORE stuttering. The cycle is cynical. Now, at 20+ years old, we can finally take a step back and look at our situation. Do we stutter? Yes. Have we tried to control our stutter? Yes. Can we control our stutter? No. Why? How come when I go into a meeting/class, with the information known like the back of my hand, I still stutter??? Simple. Your brain isn’t concerned about the information when you go to speak. It’s concerned about not stuttering. Here’s a summarized analogy from a stuttering documentary I watched recently. “If you put a plank of wood on the ground and ask a person to walk across it they likely could without fail. Toe-to-heel the whole way. Now, raise that plank 15 feet in the air and ask them to do it again. Suddenly they start to struggle. They’re no longer walking Toe-to-heel. They have their arms out, they’re unsteady. They’re no longer worried about cross the plank, they worried about falling. That one single fear cause them to lose confidence, become unbalanced, and more likely to fall. Speaking is no different for most stutters. With friends many can be fluent, though put them in front of their peers and they because to lose balance. They’re no longer worried about speaking, they’re worried about stuttering.” The above quote REALLY resonates with me. It puts the “Don’t let your stutter bother you.” phrase into a whole new perspective. The goal isn’t to suddenly say “I stutter, can’t change it so I’ll deal with it.”. That’s a defeatist mindset and a recipe for a mental health crisis. So by reframing your understanding of your stutter and by acknowledging it, not correcting it, you can begin to FINALLY may progress towards lessening anxiety when speaking. Which immediately removes a factor known to compound our stutter. So the above comments saying “You can’t change it, you just have to deal with it.” have their hearts in the right place, it’s just awfully simplistic. Seeing as you’re in med-school, I’m inclined to believe you’d benefit MUCH more from detailed analysis and experiences than guide less words of encouragement. So so so happy to drop references and discuss more in this thread if you’re interested in experiences and lessons learned through my journey they may help supplement your own! 💜