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From: Bob Quesal
Date: 10/3/02
Time: 1:30:59 PM
Remote Name: 143.43.201.67
Hi Dawnyale:
As I mentioned in a reply to an earlier post, I think SLPs need basic knowledge and tolerance of stuttering. Not everyone has that, and I agree that it should come in stuttering classes. I think we do a real disservice when we assume that stuttering is just the surface behaviors. My students accuse me of being to "touchy-feely" in my class (figuratively speaking - I don't want the Equal Opportunity & Title IX officer stopping by my office). ;-)> I do spend a good bit of time on the psychosocial aspects of stuttering. But the point is that the clients who are the most challenging to deal with are those who find it difficult to be fluent all the time. As Steve Hood pointed out, many clients are fluent most of the time, but when they are disfluent they have considerable struggle and effort. And the fear of those breakdowns and the struggle and effort is part of what we have to address clinically. We should understand the importance of this for these individuals, not dismiss it as "you could be fluent if you tried."
I'm not suggesting this is the case for all people who stutter. I don't think anything is true for ALL people who stutter. In fact, what is probably so annoying to me about the letter I quote in this ISAD essay is the author's dogmatic stance that "all stutterers are capable of normal fluency." "You do it some of the time, why not do it all the time?" Well, why don't basketball players always hit their free throws? They do it some of the time, why don't they do it all the time? Or why don't baseball players get a hit all the time? Or pitchers throw strikes all the time? I noticed that the letter writer didn't have particularly good handwriting - if he can write letters clearly some of the time, why can't he do it all the time?
I think it all boils down to basic human decency (which I guess I'm not demonstrating in a lot of these replies - it's something else I can't do all the time, I guess). As SLPs, we can't force our reality on to our clients - we have to learn from their reality and work together.
This may or may not have addressed your question. Thanks for your comments!
BQ