Graphic by Priscilla Du Preez
I don’t remember when I started stuttering — though I’m almost certain it was before I was a teenager — but I do remember writing my anxieties about starting high school in my journal at age 14. My biggest worry wasn’t where I would sit at lunch, or if I would get lost in the new building, but something far more simple: introducing myself.
Although my full name is Michaela, Kaylee is a nickname I’ve had since the first grade. I went through all of grade school responding, “You can call me Kaylee,” to my teachers calling “Michaela” off the attendance list. Aside from being more or less short for Michaela and a compromise between Katie and Emily — which my dad wanted to name me before my mom won him over — Kaylee was simple. There weren’t a dozen ways for people to mispronounce it, and it was only two syllables. But upon entering high school, I wanted to go by Michaela; I had a newfound appreciation for the name my parents gave me and it made me feel more grown up, marking this transition. Plus, one name is less complicated than two.
But for whatever reason, saying “Michaela” was always an arduous task. My lips, or my tongue, or my vocal chords seemingly would not cooperate with my brain. There were other words I stuttered on, but those could more easily be substituted, or avoided, or contrived in some way to make it less obvious that I was struggling to speak fluently (I later learned this technique of substitution and avoidance is called covert stuttering, as opposed to overt st-st-st-stuttering). My name, however, is one word I can’t substitute or pretend has momentarily slipped my mind. Combined with the anxiety of meeting new people and making a good impression, “Michaela” often turned into “Mmm-Mmm-Mmm-Mmmichaela,” which got me strained smiles, disbelieving snickers and snarky comments.
Stuttering is all about tension. When you stutter, it is because there is tension either in your lips, tongue or vocal chords, depending on which muscles are used to make that particular sound. When you stutter on a specific word and the result is embarrassment and shame, your body remembers that feeling and, in the future, will create that tension before you even move the muscles to say the word. Each time I stuttered over my name and wanted to melt into a puddle, it just made things worse.
I went through my adolescence — and continue to go through early adulthood — letting my stuttering dictate how I interact with people. Sometimes, not speaking at all was less embarrassing than not speaking fluently, so I became more shy. I perceived myself as socially awkward because I was worried I would make people uncomfortable by stuttering; I convinced myself that my stuttering — and my fear of it — made me a bad public speaker and an inept leader.
All of this being said, my stutter is mild — I probably speak with 90%-95% fluency, and it is never noticeable enough that anyone has recommended speech therapy. However, it causes me a lot of anxiety. This summer, my boyfriend and I were on our way to a graduation party for his friends, many of whom I hadn’t met yet. I asked, as casually as possible, if he was going to introduce me to everyone. I hadn’t told him that I stuttered because it hadn’t really come up in our several months of dating, and I was trying to avoid the discomfort it would cause me to talk about it. After meeting his friend’s parents, one of them told me he didn’t quite catch my name. I struggled to get past the “M” to the rest of my name, and it felt like everyone around me had stopped what they were doing to turn around and stare. I almost cried on the spot. I apologized, telling the man I had “a bit of a stutter.” The moment passed, but the lump in my throat and my accelerated heartbeat remained. On the walk home, my boyfriend said, “I didn’t know you stuttered.”
“Yeah, I guess it’s not really noticeable,” I said, “but I don’t like talking about it. It’s so embarrassing when that happens.”
He asked a couple other questions and said again that he hadn’t noticed it at all, which I appreciated, but I didn’t want to continue the conversation. In saying that he hadn’t noticed it, he meant to make me feel less embarrassed, but it also made me feel a little invalidated, as if the mental gymnastics I had always gone through to avoid certain words or the anxiety I dealt with were unnecessary.
This summer, soon after I turned 20, I decided to go to speech therapy. It’s been uncomfortable to practice stuttering on purpose, but the goal is to desensitize myself so that when it does happen occasionally, my body doesn’t kick into fight-or-flight mode. Slowly, I am transitioning away from avoiding stuttering at all costs and toward the possibility of disclosing that I stutter to my professors and friends.
Stuttering can be an immensely frustrating and isolating experience. Only a small percentage of the population stutters, and an even smaller percentage are women. Many people don’t understand why people who stutter can’t just “spit it out.” It is a neurological process, so there is no quick fix or easy solution. In my first session of speech therapy, my stomach dropped when I realized that I was probably not going to just be able to “get rid” of my stutter. Since then, on podcasts and in articles, I have heard people push back on the idea that they should want to get rid of their stutter. Why should they have to change the way they naturally speak? While I feel solidarity with people who feel this way, I am also somewhat ashamed to say that I think of myself as separate — it’s OK for other people to stutter, but not for me.
For now, I will still put my fingers to my wrist to feel my quickening pulse when I know I am going to have to introduce myself to people, and I will keep believing that I can make my speech patterns “better.” Maybe (hopefully) I will grow out of this anxiety, but either way, I hope that someone reading this will deepen their understanding of what it’s like to be a person who stutters; or better yet, I hope that someone who does stutter can read this and know that no matter how you feel about stuttering, there are other people right there with you.
Note: the title of this article comes from the motto of the National Stuttering Association, which offers support, resources and opportunities to connect with other people who stutter.