Send him this, from a mod of /r/stutter, who you can assure is not an expert in anything but graphic design occasionally, lol. --- For almost every stutterer, there is a person in their life who has the best intentions to make conversation flow smoothly with their loved one, and ends up frequently finishing their sentences. While surely born out of something positive, this can have many negative effects for people who stutter. I'll attempt to give an overview on why that is. 1. **Breaking the flow of conversation.** There is always a flow to a stutter, even if it doesn't feel like it to someone who is fluent. Like you, we are planning our words carefully. Probably even *more* carefully, so as to avoid unnecessary trip-ups. When you interrupt us to fill in our words, you're unknowingly breaking our concentration and progress. 1. **Shifting the focus of the conversation.** Once this becomes a habit to fill in sentences, suddenly large parts of every conversation we have are being dedicated to a 'guessing game' of what we're trying to say next. This is major suckage, right here. It's already a huge energy expenditure for us to fight our way through disfluency. If we're choosing to do so, surely we have something important to say. Suddenly, that important thing takes a back seat to predicting our words. Very frustrating. Imagine speaking to someone about a topic you're super interested in, and having them suddenly try to guess what color socks you're going to wear the next day. 1. **Speaker feeling rushed.** In an attempt to avoid the above frustrations, it's common for a stutterer to feel as though they need to 'hurry up' and get the word out before the flow and focus of the discussion can be broken. This fosters an unnecessary sense of urgency that actually ends up making our stutter even worse. If you'd like to support a stutterer, the absolute best thing you can give them is your patience. This shows that there is no rush and the speaker has time to properly form their words. This is good healthy stuff! 1. **Lack of challenge.** One of the best things for a stutterer to do is shed their avoidance mechanisms and begin speaking more assertively in situations they normally would shrink away from. This can mean big things, like making an important phone call. Or it can mean small things, like choosing to begin using as many 's' words as possible, since that's what you stutter on most. But it's difficult to meet a challenge and grow as a stutterer when no one will let you. We understand it's probably not a pretty process to feel a part of. But this will go a long way in our speech habits, for years to come. Know that by just being patient and waiting, you are a part of not just something un-pretty, but something very useful to us: practice! 1. **Word ownership.** Sometimes stutterers can feel a disconnect between the technical use of words and ourselves. This makes sense if you consider that, while speaking, 90% of our energy is going into the act of moving our mouths to form proper sounds and fighting against roadblocks with the rest of our body. So only like 10% of energy goes to what we're feeling or how we're conveying it. As a result, it can be difficult to feel like we're actually expressing ourselves when we're speaking. Sometimes this can make the effort of expending that 90% of energy seem fruitless. When someone finishes our words, this makes that feeling about thirty times worse. It can be like... why bother? It's not like I'm actually doing anything. I'm not getting my feelings across, I'm not feeling fulfilled, and the person I'm speaking to can just finish my sentences anyway. I'm a very big advocate for owning my words. I'm working for them, I'm putting in the labor, I'm choosing them carefully, I'm rising to the challenge, they're *mine*. Please, don't take them. Expressing myself, getting the words out, is literally my only incentive for doing this. To a fluent speaker, it might not seem like much. But for us, it can be the difference between motivation and, "Why bother?" Some stutterers actually do find it helpful and useful to have their thoughts completed. Neither stutterer is wrong. We all have our preferences. This is why it's most important to communicate with a stutterer and give them time to fully express what may help or hinder them most. --- Hope this can help!