Old stutterer here who got dramatically better. I want all of you to know that you always have someone to talk to or ask questions or just freakin' vent to. Also, I want you to know that it does get better. Always keep hope alive.

Old stutterer here who got dramatically better. I want all of you to know that you always have someone to talk to or ask questions or just freakin' vent to. Also, I want you to know that it does get better. Always keep hope alive. I joined this sub not too long ago and I was reading all of the posts here and a lot of you younger guys remind me so much of myself when I was coming up as a wee lad. If only I had this safe haven in which to vent and commiserate, I would've not spent so many years depressed and miserable. But that was yesteryear. Today, I'm 35 years old and I'm a working professional in an office setting, in charge of marketing and various PR related stuff, including holding meetings and such where I have to speak publicly. But as a child/kid/adolescent/teen/freshman, I was a complete fucking stuttering mess of shot nerves. Couldn't say my name, always dreaded reading out loud in class, screw phone conversations, just all that awful shit. I've lost count of how many times I've felt burning shame and desperately just wanted to be snuffed out on the spot. I've been embarrassed in front of my entire elementary school on closed circuit TV...just frozen in wild sputtering panic. I've been a drunken pillhead in college because self-medication gave me fluency but took away vital physical and mental faculties like oh basic memory recall and coordination. I want you to know that it does get better. There is light at the end of the tunnel and I know it sounds cliche as hell but you will look back on these trying times and you'll discover that all this fucking hardship has shaped you into the confident person that you are/will become. You are tough as fuck for it. Just keep up with practicing and keep the hope alive and keep trying and keep talking and sow the seeds of confidence that will eventually blossom and just keep nurturing that shit with positivity until it becomes your real, innate sense of unassailable confidence. Sort of an aggressive fake it until you make it philosophy. The inches we need are everywhere around us. Add up all those inches and that's what makes the fuckin' difference between winnin' and losin'. Between livin' and dyin'. - Al Pacino's inches speech from "Any Given Sunday" It all starts with the little victories. "Cool, I went to a restaurant and ordered food and I didn't have to switch my order last minute to a dish I could pronounce" - little things like that. They add up. I also want you to know that I still stutter. It's not completely gone but it's light years from where it used to be. You will learn that at the end of the day, everyone makes mistakes. Ours just happens to be speech impediments. And that's how I view it today. Given a lifetime of speech therapy, good friends to practice with, yoga, guided meditation, tricks, breathing, all that shit - I'm really happy with who I am now because I'm nearly fluent and I just want you to know that I care. I know I'm just a faceless screen name in an uncaring digital series of tubes, but due to our shared pain and anguish of stuttering, I feel a kinship with all of you in this subreddit because I know how you feel down to every last pang of anxiety. A lot of you are in a great deal of pain and that's okay. I'm not saying oh hey, stop being sad because that's just silly. What I am saying is that you are not alone. And if you ever want to talk, vent, ask questions or whatever. I'm here. And if there are others who have gotten over their stutter, perhaps you guys can drop some of your knowledge and experiences in this thread for the younger folks to read, digest and learn from. Thank you.