<story><title>Why some people suffer from a stutter</title><url>https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20200922-why-some-people-suffer-from-a-stutter</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>matthewheath</author><text>I have a stutter. I went to a speech and language therapist, which helped a little bit. For the longest time I couldn&amp;#x27;t say words like &amp;quot;Wednesday&amp;quot; (stuttering on the W) or even simple phrases like &amp;quot;Yes sir&amp;#x2F;ma&amp;#x27;am&amp;quot; when at secondary school (I believe this is known as a &amp;quot;block&amp;quot;, my mouth just wouldn&amp;#x27;t work; I froze up).&lt;p&gt;I&amp;#x27;m not entirely sure what helped me overcome the problem. If I&amp;#x27;m relaxed, my speech is fluent. If I take deep breaths and think about what I&amp;#x27;m going to say, the stutter rarely shows up. There are, of course, some words that I mispronounce still like &amp;quot;manipulative&amp;quot;.&lt;p&gt;The only real ongoing issue is the learned habit of speaking quickly to try and overcome the stutter. Internally, I can understand exactly what I said, but externally it apparently comes out as a stream of unintelligible words. That&amp;#x27;s something I&amp;#x27;m still working on.&lt;p&gt;The stutter comes back when I&amp;#x27;m tired, nervous, or stressed. Apart from that, it&amp;#x27;s barely noticeable which I am pleased about.&lt;p&gt;How curious to know that it&amp;#x27;s all in the brain rather than a psychological cause such as anxiety which is what my parents used to assume. Perhaps I shall have to volunteer to help with future research.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>Scarblac</author><text>I had therapy for years as well, didn&amp;#x27;t help.&lt;p&gt;Until one day. They had taught us a very artificial way to speak, a sort of very slow, very loose su-su-stuttering on purpose. 15-year old me &lt;i&gt;hated&lt;/i&gt; it.&lt;p&gt;Then they made us go into stores, and ask for things using this technique. A couple of AA batteries, in my case, using that technique. I dreaded this, thought it was completely ridiculous.&lt;p&gt;But the guy behind the counter didn&amp;#x27;t care one bit, bless him. He didn&amp;#x27;t appear to notice anything and just helped me with my batteries.&lt;p&gt;That single exercise hammered home that &lt;i&gt;it was ok&lt;/i&gt; for me to stutter. Completely unthinkable idea, before then.&lt;p&gt;That realization reduced the problem by half in one day, and I never really cared about it anymore. It gradually disappeared in twenty five years or so after that without therapy or whatever. It ceased to be a problem for me on that day.</text></comment>
<story><title>Why some people suffer from a stutter</title><url>https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20200922-why-some-people-suffer-from-a-stutter</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>matthewheath</author><text>I have a stutter. I went to a speech and language therapist, which helped a little bit. For the longest time I couldn&amp;#x27;t say words like &amp;quot;Wednesday&amp;quot; (stuttering on the W) or even simple phrases like &amp;quot;Yes sir&amp;#x2F;ma&amp;#x27;am&amp;quot; when at secondary school (I believe this is known as a &amp;quot;block&amp;quot;, my mouth just wouldn&amp;#x27;t work; I froze up).&lt;p&gt;I&amp;#x27;m not entirely sure what helped me overcome the problem. If I&amp;#x27;m relaxed, my speech is fluent. If I take deep breaths and think about what I&amp;#x27;m going to say, the stutter rarely shows up. There are, of course, some words that I mispronounce still like &amp;quot;manipulative&amp;quot;.&lt;p&gt;The only real ongoing issue is the learned habit of speaking quickly to try and overcome the stutter. Internally, I can understand exactly what I said, but externally it apparently comes out as a stream of unintelligible words. That&amp;#x27;s something I&amp;#x27;m still working on.&lt;p&gt;The stutter comes back when I&amp;#x27;m tired, nervous, or stressed. Apart from that, it&amp;#x27;s barely noticeable which I am pleased about.&lt;p&gt;How curious to know that it&amp;#x27;s all in the brain rather than a psychological cause such as anxiety which is what my parents used to assume. Perhaps I shall have to volunteer to help with future research.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>gee_totes</author><text>What if the stress level affects the dopamine level and that affects the stutter?&lt;p&gt;I have a stutter too and this was a very interesting article to add to my &amp;quot;head-canon&amp;quot; on why people stutter. My stutter is also affected by moods. Maybe we&amp;#x27;re living -- or rather, speaking -- on the edge of the brain-body connection.</text></comment>