introversion and extroversion

Crumble Froo

have been thinking about this myself a good bit lately, and wonder what ye may reckon. ive had problems with my speech as long as i can remember, though went to speech therapy while in primary school for a while. that was grand, and my problems reduced to the most subtle of things for the most part.

however, when nervous, which i usually am around new people, or in generally stressy situations, it comes back full blown, and in my teens, i went through some sh*t that had me pretty much on edge 24/7. resultingly, i spent most of my years very introverted and would avoid meeting new people, or saying too much to anyone.

starting college, i decided i had to change that, and put a lot of effort into helping myself relax more. long story short, now that i ahve my speech stuff under control a bit better, i am a lot more extroverted. i really enjoy people's company, and am much easier going when talking to new people.

comparing that to my teens, is like chalk and cheese, completely. i was wondering, if anyone else has experienced something to that effect at all?

i know three sisters from my area who all had speech problems and they were all very very comfortable in tehmselves, at least during secondary school, when i knew them. so i know that the introversion thing could be just me.

mostly im just curious though...?

ParkRunner

Youre talking a lot of sense there alright. I went through a similar pattern to yourself, very shy as a teenager, didnt really get involved in anything or hang around with too many people, just stuck with the same few people all through school.
Now I'm much more confident and while I do still feel a bit self concious about having a stammer I have come to accept it more and realise people have their own problems too which they worry about. I guess like any teen, insecurity and sensitivity are natural and having a stammer makes it much more difficult to socialise. Went to three Xmas parties this week though so may have swung a little bit too far the other way

Pigeon Reaper

Same with me. Years of speech therapy and very quite until I got to college. I made an active decision to change and forced myself to talk to new class mates etc. I originally had trouble meeting girls but got around this too. The first question was always where I was from as I don't have a normal accent and the worst of the impediment seemed to have gone at that point. I still can't bear to hear any recordings of myself or my voice amplified.

Cravez

Reading your post OP basically sounded exactly the same as me! . I went to speech therapy when i was in primary school as i was late in learning to speak and developed stammers etc. It all went grand and it became less and less but i was still introverted and only hung around with my friends that i had already knew (and was comfortable speaking around) as i was afraid it would crop up again, as like what you said, when i meet new people it starts to creep back a little bit

As i got older i just became more relaxed about it,accepted it and decided not to get so stressed about it and that seemed to work for me and i don't very often stammer (although there a few words still i sometimes have trouble saying) compared to what it is. I find if you keep busy with what you enjoy doing and doing around others then you get along fine as your not as self concious about it around people who.... you could say share same interests as yourself.