Kids are great, they don't have any inhibitions or awareness about people's sensitivities and to be honest sometimes it is quite refreshing. Recently I have found it very hard to speak. Usually, speaking to children makes my speech much more fluent; I'm not entirely sure why but something about it being my comfort zone and the sing-song voice that most people adopt when with a small child makes it improve. However, in the last few weeks this has not been the case.
I have just started a block of speech therapy consisting of the usual breathing work and using soft sounds to start a word etc. All of this I have done before when I was a child and do not have the fondest memories associated with it. Any time I go back to therapy, I instantly think if all of my bad experiences of it and have to fight the 'fight or fly' reaction to it. But it's been very helpful, holistic and everything that I never thought therapy could actually be like so it's good.
Last week in speech therapy as I started to describe a very hard week with stammering and air all of my frustrations with not being able to express all of the thoughts in my head, how I can't 'jump' into a conversation at the right moment so I avoid speaking all together sometimes and bow unbelievably stupid I feel when I stammer I couldn't help but cry. This was not my intention as my childhood memories have taught me to not bring emotion to therapy as it never goes down too well, but it was too late to stop myself. They were very nice about it and helped me to realise that it doesn't make me look stupid at all. Since then, my speech has been so much better which is so nice, it makes me so happy that I'm able to get through one sentence without stopping and that I can talk to children without stopping over every word. I think I have downplayed the effect that my feelings about my stammer and the mountain of frustration that I feel towards it, has on my voice. I wish I could stop these feelings but I think it's a natural reaction to being trapped by your body and being unable to voice who you are and what you believe in. So my only solution is to vent more often, I needed to cry about it and will probably need to many more times in the future. I know that it'll fluctuate throughout my life as different stresses take their toll but I do not want to do myself a disservice by letting my stammer control when I speak. It will not win.
