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Do stutterers bounce? I've been traveling a lot in the world for the last few years and going from nation to nation... I've always found it interesting when I meet fellow mild stutterers. We seem to have a way of gaining lots of insights about ourselves when we meet... and after we take leave of each other. But we DO bounce! We don't seem to ever have the opportunity to spend much time with each other. I just lost the chance to be a roommate to a guy who really would have been great for me. He lives in a beautiful part of town... but I think it was because during the interview: 1. He was stuttering 2. I was talking very clearly 3. My face just brightened when he stuttered... because of my own lifelong experience as a mild stutterer ... There was another experience the other day... when I was having a really wonderful conversation with an eastern European guy from Poland. We had been in a language class together for six weeks and hadn't ever talked - but now at this little outing our class had together in the park - beers and snacks (which is allowed here in Europe) - we had the most AWESOME conversation all about a range of topics. I was starting to think that this guy would be a great person to work with. I have some ideas about various computer startup concepts that would be timely about now... and he's just starting a computer science degree here in Germany because he is wanting an avenue to get himself settled in the USA (which is not easy for a man with a Polish passport). Meanwhile, I had some HUGE insights about how stuttering might manifest itself in eastern Europe, versus in the USA. This guy was "blocking" (if that's the word for it) in English, and yet maybe he didn't do it in his native Polish. I told him that I noticed his stuttering, and quickly added that I was a stutterer myself... and that's one of the reasons I thought it was great to get to know him. The next day, at the exam, we met again... and he was hesitant to give me his contact information... and so I decided to let it go, and hope that we would meet someday on the university campus here. But guess what? I had a big rethink about my near term future that very weekend and I did something very uncharacteristic for me. I signed a lease and backed out of it, deciding to go home to the USA instead for a few months. I seem to remember this happening before at a certain point of my life. It's like the curse of God... you act irresponsible, and you change your whole life around on the spur of the moment... all because you mentioned to another stutterer that you noticed it. Does anyone else have stories about "bouncing" after meeting another stutterer?