commentr/StutterFebruary 2, 2015

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Hey, thats a good observation. A lot of people put so much weight on fluency that as long as they can get out their words, they dont care how confounding they sound. Well I can tell you from experience (and asking a lot), listeners would much rather just hear you stutter but say your words like anyone else. no running starts, weird fillers and overused interjections. I wanna commend you on being proactive, trying toastmasters and looking back to therapy. Therapy is really tricky because it is actually pretty damn hard to find a great therapist who really gets the issues and knows what to do about them. Instead of therapy, i'd save up and if you live in the US, i'd make it out to the NSA conference. Going there is going to give you a world more than some individual therapy. I strongly recommend it. As for tips, I'm wary to give advice but I would try to very slow and systematically give yourself a couple assignments each day. Seriously though, just a few (2-3) where you will speak and will try to be as coherent as you can. The MAIN focus is that you will speak in a way that is clear and this has NOTHING to do with fluency or how much you stutter. You can still on every word but at long as you don't throw in a bunch of other nonsense it will be totally fine. you'll just be stuttering a lot when speaking but stuttering IS ok. blabbering, running starts, fumbling, not making sense is whats not helpful. I recommendation, start with a habit you really want to work on. Just pick one! dont try to eliminate all of them in an assignment. pick one and make that your focus. you're goal will be to not use that bad behavior. Again, how much you stutter or the listener's reaction is not your worry for this specific moment/assignment. Focus on your goal (of not doing ___ behavior) and move through it. Start in easy situations and get really good at not using this behavior. then you'll be able to move on to tougher situations. But the key is start slow and keep steady. its really easy to burn yourself out and get dejected.

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Coping & AdvocacyCommunity & Support

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Self-Advocacy & BoundariesResearch & ResourcesFluency Techniques