I think you've described many of us to a tee. It's crazy, it's like we're stopped in slow motion, watching people speed through sentences and 'excuse' themselves the rare times they stutter a little as if it were offensive to others. They look at you when you stutter, baffled, they genuinely don't understand. With my parents, I actually find that I'm more prone to stuttering sometimes. Anyways, the real reason I wanted to comment was to tell you this: "I still can't accept this as my life" Yep, we only have one life. After years of dealing with this, you probably know as well as me that we can't depend on others to help us out (except speech pathologists obviously) or to understand our situation (even with good intentions, our family members and their ignorance about stuttering sometimes hurts us more than help us). Therefore, the person who suffers most from giving up this fight...is us. No one else suffers more dude. So what will it be? We might as well give this our all. There's no point in giving up dude. You are your best advocate and it can surprise the extent to which your mindset and self-perception affect your actions and success in life. Don't let stuttering hold you down. **No fear, not stuttering, not embarrassment, is more important than you and your dreams**.