How Stuttering Taught Me To Love Myself
Having a quirk isn’t all bad.
We all have things we’d like to change about ourselves that we can’t. Maybe it’s a birthmark or scar you have. Or a medical condition that you have to deal with everyday. For me, it was my stutter.
I’ve stuttered my whole life. And not the occasional tongue twist or pause because you can’t come up with the word. I’m talking about repeated words and prolonged sounds consistently throughout a conversation. These funny little bumps and interruptions in my speech pattern can make talking with me a bit… unusual.
For those who are unfamiliar, stuttering is a speech disorder characterized by disruptions in speech like repeated sounds or words (called repetitions), stretched out sounds (called prolongations) or not being able to say a word at all (known as blocks). Historically, it was connected to our emotions, but now we know that those of us who stutter actually process language differently in the brain than those who don’t.
Imagine you took a big spoonful of peanut butter and then tried to answer a question. That is the closest comparison I can think of to stuttering. You know the word, it’s right there on the tip of your tongue, you just can’t say it. So freaking frustrating.
And as a kid I hated it. All I wanted to do was be “normal” just like all the other kids in my class. I was jealous of how easily they could express themselves and that they weren’t terrified of making phone calls. I wanted to be someone else. Plus, kids aren’t the best at showing compassion for things they don’t understand.
But the more I tried to be fluent, the worse my speech got. I went through a time in middle school when I rejected everything about stuttering — I quit speech therapy, ignored strategies I learned to make my speech easier, and pretty much tried to pretend stuttering didn’t exist.
You can imagine imagine how that went… Complete. Disaster.
My speech was the worst it had ever been. I struggled so hard. Every conversation caused anxiety and frustration. I don’t think I liked myself very much either because I was rejecting a part of myself.
But it turns out that the struggle was what I needed to learn that the only way to help my speech was to accept it and myself. Once I *finally* did that, my world changed. My speech was easier, I felt lighter, more confident and people around me felt it.
The more we try to hide the things we don’t accept, the bigger they get. It’s like adding gasoline to a campfire. And hiding that quality also means we end up hiding a part ourselves, which takes so. much. energy. Energy that can be used on so many other things that bring you joy.
I have come to love my stutter. Is it inconvenient? Yes. Frustrating at times? Absolutely. But it’s a part of me… and that isn’t going to change.
