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Victory Had a rare win today. I’m a professor at a decent size public university. I was asked to be on a speakers panel related to my academic and professional experience. There’s maybe 50 students in the room which isn’t a huge deal but having other professors and faculty present increased my anxiety a bit. Before the presentation, I was introducing myself and making small talk with other panelists. I start with this one person and she asks my name and department. My name came out fine but had a significant block on my department. One of those blocks where it’s 2-3 seconds of silence. Right as I’m coming out of the block, this person says “do you need some time to think about it?” And tried joking about my block. I looked her dead in the said “I have a stutter, sometimes it’s hard to get my words out”. And she said “oh that’s okay” and I said “I wasn’t apologizing just telling you”. I’m so fucking tired of apologizing for existing or having to act small because others can’t handle 2-3 seconds of uncomfortable. It was a victory!! I stuttered my way through the panel discussion and said everything I wanted to and had great conversation after. I’m done apologizing for my stutter. TLDR - I told someone I have a stutter with was interpreted as me apologizing for having a stutter. I told her I wasn’t apologizing.