postr/StutterMay 1, 2020

Anyone else forgot how to communicate?

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Content

Anyone else forgot how to communicate? My stutter came up in middle school, grew worse in high school and became much better during university and today I mostly manage to go unnoticed on my good days. In parallel, my personality seems to have changed quite drastically, obviously due to growing up but I believe also to a great extent because of my stutter. I used to be very communicative and social as a kid but became more and more silent during adolescence. Today people would likely describe me as introverted. I remember only a handful of occasions I actually said something during classes. At the same time, I think my communication skills didn't progress at all. I often form simple sentences and when I feel a block coming up I just end the sentences and get lost in my string of thought. Many things I say probably don't make much sense and I leave it to the opposite party to figure out what I meant to say. Talking is so complicated that my mind sometimes changes to panic mode and stops thinking so that I don't remember what I really wanted to say. So not only stuttering prevents me from talking but also my slow brain. I'm so impressed by my fluent peers and their eloquence while I seem to have the communication skills of a 5 year old... Does anyone else experience this and how do you keep cool and stay focussed during talking?

Themes

Anticipation & AvoidanceEmotional ExperienceSpeech & Stuttering

Subthemes

Avoidance & SubstitutionHelplessness & AgencyBlocks & StoppagesLoss of Control