a st-st-stutter

The Bollox

ugh. I have had a very embarresing stutter for a few years, as I came out of my shell more in recent times it sort of went away, but shows up in some of the worst situations, I hate it!

I mean for instance I am a barman, sometimes I would tell a customer what their order came to, they would not hear, ask me again and I would just plain not be able to say it, it's VERY embarresing, and the fact that I sometimes get weird looks doesn't help

other situations would be if I have something really, and I mean REALLY witty to say about something, and I just can't say it :mad:

does anyone else on here suffer from one? and if you have, or had preferably, how did you over come it (I haven't got the time, money or patience for a speech therapist)

Little-Devil

I use to have a small stutter when i was younger. I was always told to read book but out loud and not in your head. I sometimes still stutter but it only happens if im laughing. I feel your pain, but give it go, it worked for me.

Victor

I think, for both sides, its down to relaxing. Gettting stressed brings on stutters and stammers. The less performance pressure, the less risk of it happening.

What words / word parts does it happen for? Are there alternatives to these words?

other situations would be if I have something really, and I mean REALLY witty to say about something, and I just can't say it

This happens lots of people, whether its a complicated word or just over-excitement, sometimes it just comes out all wrong and I feel like a fool.

The Bollox

well I do search for other words with the same meanings, but it doesn't always look, and tbh you are fcuked if you make any noise, because that gets the ppls attention and you are on the spot then with a stutter :mad:

turbot

If you don't have the time or money for a speech therapist, then are do you really want to get rid of it.

Given that it is something you can learn your way out of, I'm surprised you're not more interested in dealing with it?

Basq

Marts.. have had a stutter all my life. An extremely difficult condition to actually live it - as much as i'd like to say i'm over it and can ignore it, i can't. Still have girlfriend order food for us over the food as i hate talking on the phone etc. I have learned to be more comfortable about it around my classmates and friends - and most people out there do understand and don't judge you based on it. Of course, there's still a couple of narrow minded pricks who think it's a feckin' handicap.

I bought a book by William Parry (a lawyer in the US) all about the Valsalva Mechanism (www.valsalva.org) which is a method to relax muscles and relieve pressure caused with a stutter / block.

The book is actually interesting too as it really teaches you all about stammers and different theories / causes behind it.

Bought it last year but ain't had time to sit down regularly and practice the exercises in there (as they're recommended every morning but they're certainly worth a try).

p~b

have a stutter myself, i always get stuck and cant get the words out, its very annoying.

its always clear when i'm asked a questions that i should know straight away like my name.

i wouldnt be able to read out loud, but i'd be alrite having a conversation with someone.

kwinabeeste

p~b wrote:

have a stutter myself, i always get stuck and cant get the words out, its very annoying.

its always clear when i'm asked a questions that i should know straight away like my name.

Yeah I'm similar to that especially when i'm meeting some one new! I used to be really bad like Prionsass De Rossa (Sp!) but over the years it has stopped and now only props up when i'm drunk or for some words..esp garlic in a chipper..but I would only order Garlic and cheese fries when drunk so they thinks its cos i'm drunk and no one bats an eye.

I stuttered mainly when i knew what i was gonna say before the other person asked me a question! (eg orderin food and meetin new people but I just relaxed and thought bout what i was gonna say more and as i said it has more or less gone away.

bohsboy

Howya doing,

Have had a stammer (hate that word stutter) all my life and know 100% what you are going through. Have had some really bad times with it and suffered from a fair bit of depression because of it. I have done vast amounts of research into it and spent a lot of time and money on therapy.

Few points to remember:

There is NO cure, but can be controlled very well. Dont waste your time looking for gadgets or ways around speaking or verbal situations. The only method to ease the tension is to accept the stammer and try and desensitise yourself. This basically involves letting the blocks and sounds come out if you feel a stumble coming on. Let the stammer come out and become public. One of the main fears is how we think people perceive us if we begin to stammer. Very very few people will ever comment on someone who stammers to their face and anyone who does is not worth your time. You will actually find people might respect someone who gets on with their life even with a stammer.

It is a very complicated road to recovery and you will certainly need expert help and thankfully these days there is at last people out there who are able to do that.

Personally I found speech therapy a temporary fix and not a great help.

I tried the Mc Guire Programme which was introduced in the late 90's. It runs a course every three months and aims to find a cure for people. Short term results are fantastic but after a while old habits kick in and stammering returns.

However, the best therapy I found was on the PATMAR Programme http://www.stammeringireland.ie/ISA_PATMAR.htm about three years ago. It is a group residential course for 8 days and involves a totally different approach to stammering by looking at the causes and results while providing a lot of support and techniques to get you through.

It was so successful for me that I got married this year and could say my vows and had a ten minute speech after the meal with little difficulty!

The Irish Stammering Association http://www.stammeringireland.ie meet twice a month in Carmichael House, North Brunswick Street on the first and last Tuesday of each month at 8pm. You might find this a help to meet other people and discuss various treatments and also find out you're not the only one.

PM if you need any more info and don't worry, you can beat this problem.

Mick.

kwinabeeste

Good post, will look into some of those groups.

thanks

bohsboy wrote:

Howya doing,

Have had a stammer (hate that word stutter) all my life and know 100% what you are going through. Have had some really bad times with it and suffered from a fair bit of depression because of it. I have done vast amounts of research into it and spent a lot of time and money on therapy.

Few points to remember:

There is NO cure, but can be controlled very well. Dont waste your time looking for gadgets or ways around speaking or verbal situations. The only method to ease the tension is to accept the stammer and try and desensitise yourself. This basically involves letting the blocks and sounds come out if you feel a stumble coming on. Let the stammer come out and become public. One of the main fears is how we think people perceive us if we begin to stammer. Very very few people will ever comment on someone who stammers to their face and anyone who does is not worth your time. You will actually find people might respect someone who gets on with their life even with a stammer.

It is a very complicated road to recovery and you will certainly need expert help and thankfully these days there is at last people out there who are able to do that.

Personally I found speech therapy a temporary fix and not a great help.

I tried the Mc Guire Programme which was introduced in the late 90's. It runs a course every three months and aims to find a cure for people. Short term results are fantastic but after a while old habits kick in and stammering returns.

However, the best therapy I found was on the PATMAR Programme http://www.stammeringireland.ie/ISA_PATMAR.htm about three years ago. It is a group residential course for 8 days and involves a totally different approach to stammering by looking at the causes and results while providing a lot of support and techniques to get you through.

It was so successful for me that I got married this year and could say my vows and had a ten minute speech after the meal with little difficulty!

The Irish Stammering Association http://www.stammeringireland.ie meet twice a month in Carmichael House, North Brunswick Street on the first and last Tuesday of each month at 8pm. You might find this a help to meet other people and discuss various treatments and also find out you're not the only one.

PM if you need any more info and don't worry, you can beat this problem.

Mick.

johnny_rambo

This is probably only for extreme cases of stuttering. I saw a program on discovery about a guy who had a very bad stutter. It would take him minutes to get out a sentance. The doctor gave him a device for his ear (looked exactly like a hearing aid) which got rid of his stutter fairly quickly.
I think this was the device they used...http://www.stutteringcontrol.com/index.html

This probably wouldn't work on all stutters but it really helped that guy out!

The Bollox

bohsboy wrote:

Howya doing,

Have had a stammer (hate that word stutter) all my life and know 100% what you are going through. Have had some really bad times with it and suffered from a fair bit of depression because of it. I have done vast amounts of research into it and spent a lot of time and money on therapy.

Few points to remember:

There is NO cure, but can be controlled very well. Dont waste your time looking for gadgets or ways around speaking or verbal situations. The only method to ease the tension is to accept the stammer and try and desensitise yourself. This basically involves letting the blocks and sounds come out if you feel a stumble coming on. Let the stammer come out and become public. One of the main fears is how we think people perceive us if we begin to stammer. Very very few people will ever comment on someone who stammers to their face and anyone who does is not worth your time. You will actually find people might respect someone who gets on with their life even with a stammer.

It is a very complicated road to recovery and you will certainly need expert help and thankfully these days there is at last people out there who are able to do that.

Personally I found speech therapy a temporary fix and not a great help.

I tried the Mc Guire Programme which was introduced in the late 90's. It runs a course every three months and aims to find a cure for people. Short term results are fantastic but after a while old habits kick in and stammering returns.

However, the best therapy I found was on the PATMAR Programme http://www.stammeringireland.ie/ISA_PATMAR.htm about three years ago. It is a group residential course for 8 days and involves a totally different approach to stammering by looking at the causes and results while providing a lot of support and techniques to get you through.

It was so successful for me that I got married this year and could say my vows and had a ten minute speech after the meal with little difficulty!

The Irish Stammering Association http://www.stammeringireland.ie meet twice a month in Carmichael House, North Brunswick Street on the first and last Tuesday of each month at 8pm. You might find this a help to meet other people and discuss various treatments and also find out you're not the only one.

PM if you need any more info and don't worry, you can beat this problem.

Mick.

cool man, that's some great advise

dundalk cailin

i dont have a stutter, but i had a lisp with braces many moons ago, i know how it feels to be paranoid when talking..now im in a completly different situation of not wanting to talk cos i cant speak the language and my french accent sucks..

rubadub

basquille wrote:

Still have girlfriend order food for us over the food as i hate talking on the phone etc. I have learned to be more comfortable about it around my classmates and friends - and most people out there do understand and don't judge you based on it. Of course, there's still a couple of narrow minded pricks who think it's a feckin' handicap.

It depends on your definition of handicap, I would consider it a handicap if you consider this definition from google

disability: the condition of being unable to perform as a consequence of physical or mental unfitness

or

A social disadvantage resulting from disability or impairment

But not a handicap in the sense that you deserve a handicap parking spot! I would not call a person with a stammer "handicapped" as this usually infers a very serious disability.
The problem with ordering the food, reading etc is the knowledge of the words far in advance, running over them in your mind and getting stressed. Even amongst friends telling a joke where the punchline is critical i.e. the exact word must be said. Many get by using different words instead, this could be used reading instructions out where the other person cannot see them, so change "put the tv on a stable surface" could be "put the tv on the table", benign changes but ones that would show up as odd if reading in a school classroom. There is a term for people who use this avoidance to cope, many would be unaware that people they know actually have a stammer as they do it so well.

Oriel

I have a stutter too, and also worked as a barman
The best way to handle it is by keeping your speech flowing as best as you can. In the instance where you couldn't say the amount the second time, just try to say something beforehand so that it all seems to flow as one. Something like "Let me see...yep, that's....".

There's not a lot you can do about it. It's all a psychological thing. I hate the Maguire program, and would rather stutter than be forced to completely change the way I think about breathing.

Oriel

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=107873

bohsboy

The above method with using filler words to get the eventual sentence you want out can be very dangerous for some people as this will form a habit. I used to be an "actually" person, putting in "actually" into every single sentence. It sounded carzy after a while.

The term for someone who hides their stammer very well and who avoids conversation is a "covert" stammerer. They have huge shame about their stammer and these are the people who find it hard to accept the stammer while an overt stammerer would not be as sensitive and usually responds very well to treatment.

Basq

bohsboy wrote:

The above method with using filler words to get the eventual sentence you want out can be very dangerous for some people as this will form a habit. I used to be an "actually" person, putting in "actually" into every single sentence. It sounded carzy after a while.

Spot on... i was the exact same. Also substituting letters before words to make it easier to get it out.

For example, i used to have awful hassle with vowels - and animation become "h-animation" and i was completely unaware i did it until the last speech therapist i went to pointed it out.

The Clown Man

Don't flame me if I'm way off the target here - I don't doubt that it's a very complicated and difficult issue to sort out and I can't imagine how hard becuase I don't suffer from it - but it seems to me that it's a catch 22 type of thing.

You are aware that you might stutter and the awareness makes you more likely to stutter ...

I'm sure it is embarrassing for anyone who suffers from it but I have to say that I have heard loads of people with stutters before and I have never once been of the opinion that it is anything to be ashamed of. I'm not saying that to be nice I genuinely have never thought anything of anyone with a stutter. Maybe from a listeners point of view it requires a little more concentration but honestly I think the irony of the whole thing is that the people that stutter don't realise how little others are bothered by it.

If people give you second looks it is most likely that they are trying to see if you are being serious. Reason being that they are waiting for a straight reply but what they get is slightly unexpected. I'd probably guess that some people get a split second doubt in thier minds that maybe you are taking the piss out of them. Not because they think you sound insulting; just because it catches them off guard. But I'm sure that when they realise you have a stutter they no longer think twice about it.

However, one thing you have to realise is that some chewed up sentences can sound genuinely amusing! I chew up sentances all the time (you don't need a stutter to completely fall over your words) and the first thing I do is laugh - Cause it's usually funny!

I know you all must be at the stage where it is not funny but frustrating but it always struck me that people with a stutter are in a prime position to actually have fun with it! One of the most appreciated forms of wit is that which is targeted at the teller! I mean if you stutter on a word - laugh - pick another one - make a joke of it; people will immediately be comfortable with it because they see you are comfortable with it. Find a get out word, like "Ah CR*P!" and laugh about it! And hell you might even find you can really make an amusing scenario with it. You always have the opportunity to be slightly different about it and not see it as a curse but as an amusing quirk.

Anyway if I am waaaay off the mark and if that is too much all things considered at least don't be embarrassed by it. Seriously, it is not half as embarrassing as you make yourself think it is.

Of course that's a catch 22 as well because as soon as you get comfortable with it it's gone!

p~b

I find it hard to get out some words, i call my statistics class maths instead.

And i always use filler words like emm and eh, but that sounds strange when someone asked you your name and its looks like your trying to think about it.

When i worked as a lounge boy, no one knew about my stammer, everyone just thought i was a bit slow and that i'd get mixed up and forget orders.

I dont think anybody in college actually knows about my stammer yet, but thats only because i having had to read out loud yet or give my oral report yet.

I agree with clown man, even though i have a stammer i find it funny. you have to look on the bright side of life.

I was watching tommy tiernan loose last night and he told a joke about stuttering and i was in bit laughing.

But to be honest, having a stammer is'nt the worst thing in the world, there are a lot of other things that are worse.

McGinty

Just to let you know that even though I don't have a stammer, I tell crap jokes, I have no ability for punch lines or timing. But on a more serious note, I do English in UCD and one of our lecturers has a stammer, prior to giving her first lecture, she told us that she stammers some of the time, but made a joke of it by stating that it gives us more time to take notes (which was true because she spoke so beautifully, and often when she got tired, she stammered), but my point is, that for anyone it takes guts to stand up and speak to a crowd of strangers, to do it with a stammer in my opinion is double, if not triple courage. You work in a public place, similar to the lecturer I mentioned, so triple fair play to you. One thing I noted from my lecuturer was that she took her time speaking, but also by admitting it and turning it around, she eased the tension within herself.

The Bollox

well the thing is, it's kinda hard to explain with a stammer. it's like you can 'picture' the word but are just unable to form it, as if something is pulling it back from coming out. I mean in my case it's no so much a st-st-stammer, as it is a ... *strange face* stammer. a friend of mine jokes about it, sometimes it can help, and I laugh about it too, but he does take it too far on occation and I do get píssed!.

Clown Man, your advise was very good, I will try that and see how it goes

rubadub

bohsboy wrote:

The above method with using filler words to get the eventual sentence you want out can be very dangerous for some people as this will form a habit. I used to be an "actually" person, putting in "actually" into every single sentence. It sounded carzy after a while.

The term for someone who hides their stammer very well and who avoids conversation is a "covert" stammerer. They have huge shame about their stammer and these are the people who find it hard to accept the stammer while an overt stammerer would not be as sensitive and usually responds very well to treatment.

covert, thats the one! I wouldnt say it is "very dangerous" though. It is made famous by the cartoon character after bugs bunny (porky pig?) When I get that rabbit I am going to keee-ki ki ki ki, MURDER him. Most actors like that do it totally wrong, esp. Ronnie Barker in that old show with David Jason.
Carly Simon stuttered and sang instead of talking, alright if you are a female singer with a nice voice, cant see a big lad in the chipper singing "I'll have a batter burger and chips" to some strange tune. Strange that people do not stutter when singing, putting on a different accent can also do it. Also talking in unison with others makes it go, I think thats what that earphone thing does, plays your own voice back to you in real time.