Even though I think I am a great young man and my family loves me
to bits, I have a big flaw and it is called stuttering. I never expected
it to come into my life. I already had a few issues with pronouncing certain
vowels but not to the point of stuttering. How did it happen and why was I the
one to have it? It may be genetic, is what my mother told me. No, I did not
like it at all. Still, the stuttering had to cling on to my life for the years
to come; for it surely became a test and quite a long journey of being human
and facing the real world. In the
beginning I denied the fact of stuttering and thought that I had enough power
to control it. However, another part of me thought stuttering has its own
control. It comes when it wants to and sadly, it always came at the wrong time,
HIGH SCHOOL!
Oh what a time! Class mates would usually laugh at me. That lasted
almost every year of high school. They
would laugh at me every time it was my turn to read something in class. I felt
both awkward and awful during those times. Some the people who made the
situation worse were the teachers? Yes, the teachers. When asked to read, I kept trying and trying,
but those teachers were getting impatient with me. Wow, I was actually using
effort to get through reading but they just shushed me and said, 'it's ok, stop
reading' when I "take some time" trying to get the word out. That
really made me feel like there was no use and I gave up. Every upcoming reading session I excused
myself and passed my turn to another classmate. I always felt bad for doing so
but I did it anyways. I wasn't asking for embarrassment again and again. Once,
I changed my mind and wanted to try but this time teachers started excusing me
from reading, knowing that I would stutter. Having my brother in class with me,
well, I felt a bit at ease, however the tables seemed to turn. Those so-called
friends who wanted to hear me out turned fast to my brother turned 'reference'
to tell him to say what I wanted to say. Once again, I was experiencing others impatience.
Frankly, I hated some times when my younger brother had to speak for me because
he changed my entire thoughts and gave answers that were not mine and did not
always what I meant. During that time, those so-called 'friends' started
hanging out with my brother more since they could understand him. So I lost my
hopes of making friends because of the stuttering. I couldn't take it anymore
and it was affecting my attitude towards myself and others So I went back into becoming my classic silent
type mode (which I never wanted to have in high school).
Now I look back at those times and ask myself, what have I benefitted
from stuttering? It's a bittersweet answer I must say.
The sweet realization was that I wasn't really the only one who
stutters and that many people including my own relatives stuttered. There was
one miraculous day when a speech therapist came over to my school to see me. I
felt relieved but from enduring the ignorance through the years hasn't made me
a happy spirit. He talked with me and gave me interesting methods to maintain
my speech when the stuttering came. I laugh now and roll my eyes knowing that I
was also responsible for having to stutter still. I am a stubborn person you
see. My mother, one of my best friends, and my therapist noticed that I speak
too fast. The truth pill is always nasty. I was in denial but now I admit that
I do speak very fast. I do speak fast naturally and on purpose. I say on purpose because I wanted to get out
what I wanted to say already. Speaking slowly was just my fear and it still
bothers me today even if it’s better for me. It gives me that moment when I
want to say the word correctly and I become aware of that word. It makes me
nervous and that’s how I start stuttering, from trying to say the word slowly
and thinking at the same time. So, both ways, slow or fast are hard cookies to
chew. Even though this has been hard for
me to deal with the support did come. Not everyone was ignorant to stutterers
like me and I have met many who actually supported my ordeal. They treated me
like they treated any other human being and it felt good. I finally made some friends from my
neighborhood and I almost forgot that I even stuttered with them. If I had
stuttered, those friends kept on talking with me and wanted to talk with me.
They didn't laugh or high-fived when I stuttered; they even helped me out with
guessing words for me. They were also patient. That moment felt better than
writing on a paper like my teacher said so he can get what I wanted to say (it
worked but still, writing my answers on paper was something I hated)....
When I stop slacking off, I do take time to sit down, breathe, and
start reading aloud to practice my speech. I never tried the mirror
conversation yet because I still have a long way to go with confidence and self
esteem. So it was meant to be, I thought. This was one of my life tests and I
had to face it. What we humans do not get is that not accepting what is given
to you will make things a lot harder. So I accepted the fact that I stutter and
that it's a part of me now. When I could accept that flaw, I found it possible
to move on with my real purpose of living this life. From the years, self
acceptance made me see what I have achieved from it. The silence from stuttering
has enhanced my artistic skills and I developed hidden talents. Silence was the
loudest sound in my mind when it came to showing all the noise inside my head
through the arts. Poetry, drawing and photography were my escapes from the
reality of being that teenager with a speech problem. Stuttering and silence
saved me from the cruel words I wanted to shout at people. Oh! Now that wouldn't
be a treat to stutter while swearing eh?
I still feel another side of myself fearing that I will not be
taken seriously. I had a choice to let stuttering become my ruler or to walk
through the path with my stutter and I chose what was best for me. I decided to
keep walking cause we are all meant to feel scratching branches from trees and
from ourselves. Having flaws shouldn't stop me so why will stuttering stop me
at all? I laugh once again and remind myself that I was always said to be
'unique' and the proof of it was that fate made me stutter to show and teach
other people how to cooperate with different people like myself: The tree with
its scratching branches.
16 August 2012
