Those who stutter need to concentrate on a positive attitude

"The blows of life, the accumulation of difficulties, the multiplication of problems tend
to sap energy and leave you spent and discouraged. In such a condition the true status of
your power is often obscured, and a person yields to a discouragement that is not justified
by the facts. It is vitally essential to reappraise your personality assets.

Dr. Karl Menninger, the famous psychiatrist, once said, “Attitudes are more important
than facts.” That is worth repeating until its truth grips you. Any fact facing us, even the most hopeless, is not as important as our attitude toward that fact. You may permit a fact to overwhelm you mentally before you start to deal with it. On the other hand, a confident thought pattern can modify or overcome the fact.

So if you feel that you are defeated and have lost confidence in your ability to win, sit
down, take a piece of paper and make a list, not of the factors that are against you, but of those that are for you. If you or I think constantly of the forces that seem to be against us, they will assume a formidable strength they do not possess. But if you mentally visualize and affirm and reaffirm your assets, you will rise out of any difficulty."

from The Power of Positive Thinking by Norman Vincent Peale

Helping a child who stutters

Dr. Ramig and Dr. Murphy give some helpful ways to help a child who stutters at http://www.mnsu.edu/comdis/isad11/papers/therapy11/murphy11.html

Children need to learn some coping techniques while they are young so they "change some of the learned avoidant reactions that often develop as a result of the unpleasantness of stuttering." I wonder if many of the adult stutterers would not stutter as badly if they had gotten professional help when they were young, if their parents and teachers had learned how to help them, and if they had not acquired some of the habits of avoidance and secondary behaviors that most people who stutter seem to get.

From posts that I have read online, I feel that many young people who go to a speech therapist don't get much out of it because they don't really want to be there. They don't want to have to leave their regular class in school to go to therapy. If you aren't really wanting to be in therapy at the time, how can you get anything out of it?

Being able to verbalize the fact that you stutter, being able to talk about it to your family, and being able to express your feelings about stuttering is one of the big first steps to improving your speech. Anyone who stutters or who has lived with someone who stutters will tell you that stuttering is worse if you are trying NOT to stutter. If a child knows that a parent is embarrassed by their stuttering, he/she will try not to stutter or will just stop talking. The Stuttering Foundation (www.stutteringhelp.org) has a brochure to help parents who have a child who stutters. They have books, online help, DVDs, and other material to help all ages. Dr. Ramig is coauthor of some of the materials.

Research on attitude and stuttering

Here is a great article on a survey that states "People who stutter report greater success with speech treatment that focuses on attitudes than on speech modification." Perhaps those who stutter and have gone through speech therapy with no results should focus on finding a therapist who specializes in treating stuttering as they will use all of the tools needed to help the stutterer, including changes in attitude. Read the article here http://www.asha.org/about/publications/leader-online/archives/2003/q2/030513e.htm

Stuttering and mental problems

It is so sad to read posts on various blogs and chat groups about stutterers who say that they have to deal with depression, anxiety disorder, mental problems, and being bipolar and thinking that all of these things are brought on by their stuttering. I could be wrong, but I don't think the speech mechanism not working right can cause these other problems. The person is either also prone to being mentally unstable or they allow themselves to get that way by not dealing with their attitude toward their stuttering. One role of the speech therapist is to help with attitudes and feelings so that an acceptance of the stuttering occurs at the same time a person is working on stuttering less. I bet this is important to do with young children so they don't grow into adults with more problems than just stuttering adults.

Confidence is the best cure for stuttering

Read about some teens who stutter and who believe that gaining confidence in yourself is the best thing to help with stuttering. At the end of this page http://www.stutteringhelp.org/default.aspx?tabindex=635&tabid=648 is a link to a presentation they put together. It is certainly worth watching. Take time for it to buffer and play smoothly.

Accentuate the positive

We need to concentrate on our assets and develop those things about us that we can change while we are working on making our speech better. Stopping or lessening stuttering won't happen overnight. It is something that requires work and persistance. At the same time, we will become a better person if we work on our relationships with others, treating others kindly (whether or not they are kind to us), developing varied interests so we have things to talk about as well as different things to do, involve others in our plans, and do these things without hiding in the shadows trying to keep people from hearing us stutter. If we concentrate on the stuttering and spend all of our time trying not to stutter, the stuttering will only get worse. If we concentrate on other things and let the stuttering happen while we are working on it by going to speech therapy or working on techniques on our own, things will be much better. Those stutterers who accept themselves as they are and enjoy life while they stutter are much better off than those who restrict their talking because they are afraid to stutter, who restrict their invitations to be with others because they don't want to stutter, etc.

Fear of Speaking

The book "Self Therapy for the Stutterer" explains the fear of speaking so a fluent person can understand what a person who stutters goes through.

A person who has nothing wrong with his legs "could walk easily without trouble or quite 'fluently' along a long plank, twelve inches wide, when it is placed on the ground.

But if that same plank is placed on a wall high above the ground, then, if asked to walk along the plank, he would probably develop a fear of falling. As a result, it would be difficult for him to walk along the plank in a normal way. In fact he would probably put on a poor exhibition of walking normally or 'fluently.'

This example is somewhat parallel to the problem of a stutterer. Nearly all stutterers have the physical equipment to talk properly, but in most cases the fear of stuttering causes them to try to force trouble-free speech. And since it is difficult to force the articulative mechanism of speech, he does not speak fluently."

Fear of stuttering is one thing to conquer in a quest for fluency

I was reading a health book and ran across this paragraph "It is perfectly natural for the older man to respond more slowly to sexual impetus. If the slowing down of response results in a fear of performance, this fear itself can lead to impotence ..." This reminded me of my uncle, who stuttered, saying that the more he tried not to stutter, the more he did. He said that, before he started working through the book "Self Therapy for the Stutterer," he had instances of having to do some important speaking in front of a group where it was of utmost importance for him to speak professionally. That was the time that he was the worst ever, and he thought he would lose his job over it. Only having an understanding employer helped him save face (and job). He talked to his employer and it was agreed upon that he would give the information to another employee to present for him. The other employee would let the group know that he was only presenting the information and was not to get credit for the knowledge.

Uncle Kenny went to work on his speech therapy and was happy to eventually get to do the presentations himself. He realized that the fear of stuttering was the first thing he had to work on; once he was able to go into meetings and presentations without fearing that he would stutter, he was able to talk with less stuttering.

Those Who Stutter are Not Alone

I have been thinking that there are plenty of reasons for people who stutter to not feel like they are the only ones on the planet who are treated unkindly for the way they are. I have always felt a particular empathy for anyone who stutters because I saw the frustration and anxiety my uncles and cousins endured while growing up. Of course, their parents wondered if it was something they did that caused it since most of the children and grandchildren stuttered. As I get older, I notice that I am treated differently - in some cases worse, in some cases better than when I was young, agile, and strong. I accept the changes and the fact that I can't do things the way I used to be able to do them and that some things I have to have help with. Having arthritis is not much different than stuttering. You just find other ways to get things done than the way you used to do them. People with arthritis have good days and bad days just like people who stutter. We have to be patient with ourselves and do things slower and sometimes wait for someone to help us. Those who stutter need to be patient with themselves and get help from therapists who can help. Practicing speach techniques and using tools that help speaking become easier for someone who stutters coorelates with our having to exercise to keep our limbs working and sometimes using tools that aid us in daily activities. I'm sure there are others who can relate.