My parents first noticed my stutter when I was three years old. For the longest time, I thought I would one day be rid of it. I went for speech therapy, I did fluency exercises, I prayed. But now, at age thirty, I’m fairly confident that it’s here to stay. […]
Somehow, as I progressed through high school, the expectant pauses of those listening to me were more difficult to bear that the nicknames and name calling. Often, I would not speak up, even when I had something I wanted to say.
My default setting was silence.
Read the rest of Mahangu Weerasinghe’s story, Breaking the Silence.
That’s great
My sister married a man who stuttered. He and his Mother almost had Grace’s whole family miss her wedding because his Mother said he couldn’t have any one other than his family watch/ hear him say I do. Very silly but I was pretty angry at the time. We did attend the wedding. He did stutter. Only his family made any fuss about it. Now, they are married 3+ years, second child due this month (the 17th) and he seldom ever stutters. Unless it comes up for some reason I forget he ever had a thing about stuttering. Everyone stutters occasionally. People need to decide what is worth bringing to attention and what is just not that important.
Very well put, but being different when you are younger often times can be a good thing. I am so happy I grew up the proverbial ‘loser,’ (overweight and nerdy). It has allowed me to develop humility and the ability to work on a skill (programming, running my own company, music) and get very good at it 🙂
PS Matt, I switched to DVORAK…boy it is challenging but I already see a difference in hand position and movement…I just need to give it some more time and my speed will pick up.
Congrats on Dvorak! You have a lifetime of more comfortable typing ahead of you.