I am 34 year old and I’m working as an IT-security consultant. In addition to this I am father to a little girl.
For many years I have been a covert stutterer (at least I don’t think other people have really noticed it). Blocking has mainly been my main problem, especially when I speak for longer periods. I haven’t put in much energy on figuring out why this happens. One reason I can think of is that I have been a perfectionist and planned words too much, so much that it became a habit and blocking became an issue. Then it snowballed from there.
Generally I have been able to manage things quite well on all fronts, but that does also mean there are situations where I haven’t said all the things I wanted to say because I did not want to show any blocking or stuttering. Therefore I have usually spoken less and spoken in short bursts. Throughout the years, I have regularly looked for ways to stop blocking/stuttering, but I did not find anything promising. I did not believe in the therapy programs I found, which is also very expensive.
My journey towards fluency started at the end of 2021. I don’t remember how, but I found a stuttering forum on Reddit where I started to read and ask questions. Then I randomly came in contact with one of the SAC coaches which suggested Lee’s book to me, and I checked it out. The book was spot on from the beginning, so I continued to read the book. Soon I noticed that I had been using some of the crutches for a long time, but I was not aware of them and did not have a system like Lee has. After reading the book for a half week I emailed Lee and asked for coaching. He replied the next morning and we set up a coaching session a few weeks after. Lee has given me valuable advice that has helped immensely to expedite my fluency. We had our first meeting in the middle of January 2022.
At the time I am writing this, it’s the start of April 2022. We have had seven sessions and my fluency has improved a lot since we first started talking. I have become a lot better at not planning words, I am a much better speech cop, I know the crutches good enough to avoid stutters even if I can still learn them better. I have been a PWSS for about 2 months now.
I started out with reading aloud for a minimum of one hour daily, doing minimum two auto suggestions and practicing crutches. Some days I could read for five to six hours straight. I listened to recordings of autosuggestions while I slept. In addition to this I signed up to SAC and listened to a lot of coaching videos. I became increasingly more fluent as I did this.
During the last months I have been experimenting with the crutches and combinations of them. For me it started with C1 and it worked great with the blocks that randomly appeared. I continued with combining C4 and C10. With these two crutches I was able to speak better and for longer periods of time. What really seems to do the trick for me is combining C8 and C9. With this combination I could talk for hours straight. However, I’m not stopping there. Going forward I will focus more on C11, and be better at the other crutches before progressing to second base; loving to speak in all situations.
I don’t know what have helped me the most. What I am sure of, is that reading aloud while practicing the crutches, especially C8 and C9 has helped a lot. The key is to do this so much that it becomes a habit and to do this you need to go all in. At work I hold presentations, workshops, participate in discussions and more. It might sound strange, but my job has helped expedite the processes as I can speak a lot and help build the new habit and fluency memories.
If you are questioning yourself and whether you can do this, I can tell you that you can. I work around 50 hours each week and have to manage my daughter too. My day doesn’t really have many hours left, and I can promise you I become tired at times. Set aside time. Go all in and trust the WSSA program. Find and utilize all possibilities to read, do autosuggestions and practice crutches. It will be sweat, blood and tears sometimes, but it’s worth it in the long run. You will get a much better life, and this can change a lot in a matter of weeks or a few months if you work diligently on it. I here thank Coach Lee, his books and everyone at WSSA, which is truly is “the world’s only community of EX-stutterers”. What better place could any stutterer be?
KEN, Norway, April 2022