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From: Harry Dhillon
Date: 21 Oct 2010
Time: 04:08:26 -0500
Remote Name: 163.166.8.13
Thank you Jacci so much for your post. Fear is something that is very close to me. I've felt is so intensenly, and so often, that it kind of became a part of me. A default reaction to things. A lot of stutterers live with constant fear. In fact, maybe even most fluent people do so too? I would literally dread waking up in the morning, as all I saw in the day ahead was hurdles, and obstacles, and emotionally-crippling situations. This was no way to live. In fact, it was existing, rather than living. This summer, I've started having regular heart-to-heart conversations with my 11 year old son - about taking responsibility, living at cause rather than at effect, about feelings, and about fear. We chat about his day at school, and what feelings he felt at various stages, about why he felt them, and how those feelings can sometimes be changed simply by changing the thoughts. It's life-coaching, but in a father-son bonding kind of way. I want to talk considerably with him over the years about fear - because it emotionally traps us, and suffocates us at times, because it limits us in becoming who we really are, and because it is something that affects all of us, and because it's something that no one ever teaches us about in school. If only we can learn to manage fear, then everything else falls into place so much sooner and easier. Sorry for the rant! Now, to answer you questions - "Do you have any advice for other PWS or techniques that you would recommend for Speech-Language Pathologists to help other PWS make the transition that you have? What do you think it will take for other PWS to come out of their shells, would you recommend the Toastmakers group or do you feel that was an individual preference that may not work for others?" I'm not sure if I'm qualified to give advice (!) but if I had to, then I would suggest to other PWS to firstly establish what it is you want in your life. Define your goals, and your dreams. Write them down. Focus on the goals. Increase the motivation of those goals by thinking in terms of what acheiveing that goal will do for you. Will it means lots of money? Freedom? Loving and happy? Greater health? When the motivation and hunger is there - REAL hunger - and a burning desire to achieve that goal, no matter what, then the stutter cannot stop you from achiving it. And have little goals along the way to bigger ones. Reaching each of those has an amazing affect on our confidence levels, which leads to greater successes etc. Something else which I would recommend is to become part of ther stuttering scene - that way, we are helping others, whilst being helped ourselves. Attend conferences, and stuttering related events. It's all part of the speech-therapy process. Push out of comfort zones in small small ways. Ask questions at meetings. Start ordering the food you enjoy at restuarants rather than the food you can say fluently. And when the time is right join a public speaking group like Toastmasters - when the time is right - and people will know it's the right thing to when something inside them leads on. Publicly exposing our stutter is very liberating. Taking on challenges is very empowering. And guess what? Fluent people are often in awe of stutterers for doing some of the things which they are terrified of! And in terms of PWS coming out of their shells - I'm still working on that myself! I wrote this article as a way of doing just that. Exposing myself emotionally, and sharing very personal details about my life, are all part of coming out of the closed room where I have lived for decades. As I said to my NLP coach once, "If my intentions are honourable, then I have nothing to be ashamed of". A lot of PWS (including of course, me) have a lot of shame and guilt associated with our stutter. If we act with integrity, and share love and joy with others, then we have nothing to feel ashamed about. The stutter then doesn't become part of the equation. It's the warmth and happiness we bring to those aorund us, which then starts to define us. Take care. Harry