Comment by anuragsoni | Hacker News Reader

Comment by anuragsoni | Hacker News Reader

My stutter has been my primary source of stress/anxiety for that last 12 years. Its impacted my time in college and then later at Grad School. I've had good days and bad (more good days lately), but i'll never forget the terror I used to feel whenever I had to present something in front of other people.

I skipped classes to avoid doing that, i bombed many a presentation because I had trouble with certain sentences and it impacted my grades. I think not being able to make the best of time in grad school is something I can get over eventually, but a bigger regret I have is not being able to make meaningful connections with my peers in school because I'd avoid hanging out with people because of my anxiety over my stutter. In a way it almost feels like I never experienced

I still have issues with words starting with "A" which is unfortunate since my name starts with an A. I still speak really quickly which i think comes from a habit of trying to get through speech quickly to get it over with.

I do believe that a lot of it is mostly because of my anxiety as I speak just fine when i'm relaxed, and I've been trying to work on using different words when I feel like certain phrases/words will cause problems.

It’s ironic you stutter on A because I stutter on D and M, my initials, probably more than any other sounds. Stuttering is such a head game that I think it must be that you end up stuttering more on sounds that are more important to you. For example: I worked in finance a while and started stuttering on the word “million” more than I ever did before! Then I stopped working in finance and that basically went away. Still kind of a tough word, but not very problematic. These days I’m working on a messenger and I kid you not the word “message” is hard to say. It’s pretty absurd.

That's interesting and even as something who doesn't stutter as a condition, I have sometimes when nervous or feeling exposed such as when introducing myself.

I was watching a streamer (Sweet_Anita) talk about her Tourette Syndrome and it was really similar, when she is feeling awkward the tics are frequent and obvious but when she's highly engaged and talking about something she cares about it doesn't present much at all.

this is a fascinating pattern. have you tried drinking or otherwise (legally) inducing a relaxed state to see if there's a difference? this could help isolate if anxiety or "overthinking" triggers the stuttering.

Interesting. I stutter on K which is what my name starts with.

I am sorry to hear your experiences. I hope you're in a better position mentally - I feel like it is a feedback loop effect: Stuttering causes anxiety which causes more stuttering. I had similar (not stuttering) problems when speaking in social settings. I discovered some techniques like breathing control, always thinking about what life means to me - "The king and the pawn, all go back into the same box after the game is over". I found that through some behavioral therapy, I don't have social anxiety because every situation I handle - I handle it like I am in no way obligated to please these people and even if shit hits the fan, it is not the end of the world. We are all here for a temporary period in our lives...some 80 years or so.

Not sure if this would work for others, but this is how I see the world. It helps me battle stress.

Wow, you are describing by exact experience. Except I did get over social anxiety eventually, mostly.

You may already be familiar but you might be interested in checking out the comedian Drew Lynch https://www.youtube.com/user/WordsRHard

He developed his stutter years ago after a softball accident (hit him in the throat). He ended up getting into standup comedy and is becoming pretty big.

All this is to say that the "impediment" actually adds character to him and makes him a lot more interesting and memorable in good ways. Maybe you can reframe your stutter in this positive way as well.

This is my exact experience. I am in college right now and I avoid taking courses that have a presentation component. My stutter really comes up if people are paying attention to me. Many a times, I have ended up saying I don't know the answer when I did know but just could not say it and did not want to waste everyone's time.

I took speech therapy classes once, but unfortunately did not complete them. My stutter is still there but I can now at least reduce it a lot.

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