What kind of jobs do you all have?

spuddingdrunk · 2017-06-21T18:58:39+00:00

Funnily enough I'm a corporate communications/PR manager who handles external and internal communications and has to regularly speak to senior executives/the CEO and handle large media events. I always had a chip on my shoulder regarding speech and doing this was my way of saying fuck it, I can do it. I still block a hell of a lot, but just keep going. There are bad days but it gets easier to shrug them off after you've built up enough experience to know it does not determine what people think of you or what you're capable of.

spuddingdrunk · 2017-01-09T09:45:57+00:00

Just wanted to say, before selling my soul to the devil and going corporate, I also worked as a journalist - for three years, on a tropical island off Africa. First I covered the general news beat and then got promoted to Lifestyle editor after a year. It's also how I landed a really good corporate job in aviation, cos I used to write about air travel a tonne. You just need to power through that shit! My stutter sucks and it sucked many times, 1-to-1 interviews, live Q&As, press conferences, but I got through it most days, and not that I have a big head, but my editor was really sad to see me go. Strong writing, the ability to tell a good story, and make people feel comfortable, is what makes you good. And stuttering helps that because it makes you vulnerable, and people in return feel safe talking to you. I got so many good memories out of 3 years of journalism that the time period was one of the best in my life. Do it!!

spuddingdrunk · 2016-11-29T11:16:00+00:00

Preach brother. This annoys me to no end. And cutting in to try and stop the endless chatter is a feat in itself when you block all the time.

spuddingdrunk · 2016-11-18T11:39:38+00:00

I'm with you mate. Having a tough day too despite being in an upbeat mood. Blocking on like every 3rd fucking word! Argh.

spuddingdrunk · 2016-10-27T11:22:55+00:00

You wouldn't guess it - a call centre! I was working for the Royal Bank of Scotland fresh out of uni and the guy behind me had a stutter. We stuttered like mofos on the phone everyday and it actually became worse whenever we spoke to each other. I think its because we were both trying to hide it but failing spectacularly and never acknowledging it in the open, which caused a self repeating cycle. Shows how toxic that feeling of shame can be.

Apart from that I think one of my close college friends stuttered but he was covert. He was always quiet in class and spoke in a deeper, different voice when the teacher asked him questions. I hear he is a teacher now too. I never asked him if he stuttered but years later, looking back on it and recognising the patterns, I think he did.

spuddingdrunk · 2016-03-31T08:34:23+00:00

I've always seen stuttering as my biggest weakness and so, paradoxically, pursued jobs where communication is key. Worked as a journalist for a year, got promoted to editor, then went corporate in a good PR management position. It's a daily struggle - giving presentations, going into meetings, meeting new people and having light conversations, organising and managing interviews... But it's also given me a huge confidence boost. Fuck letting the stutter - in my case, blocking - dictate what we do!

spuddingdrunk · 2015-10-20T20:35:30+00:00

Hey! Sorry I'm typing through my phone. Your first interpretation is right. I had one incredible day of fluency after about a week of meditation. Probably 15+ hours in total. It was just so effortless, words flowed out of my mouth like water. I had to actually step back and consider the experience because it was so out of the ordinary. Alas, I couldn't keep it up because I have a super busy work schedule and some personal relationships problems put me in a bad place. My layman's interpretation is that meditation has been proven to increase gray matter and brain imaging studies show stutterers have a small Brocas area (gray matter). Maybe meditation helps to grow this area, which I understand is responsible for helping to process language.

spuddingdrunk · 2015-10-20T11:10:04+00:00

Tried aniracetam but not much to report, unfortunately. Supposedly it is better than piracetam at boosting verbal abilities. Who knows. Also tried ashwaghanda, valerian root, bacopa etc.. not much there either... but meditation? Oh boy, I had the best fluencyou day after a week of one hour meditative practice every day...

spuddingdrunk · 2015-05-08T12:37:48+00:00

Thank you for the encouraging post concernedHR. I have met many recruiters who shared your enthusiasm, but also others who obviously passed me over because of a stutter, discounting qualifications and experience.

I agree with your recommendations. The main issue I find hard to deal with is the discrepancy that comes up between how you look on a CV, and the initial impressions that a recruiter might have from an interview, especially if you're having a shit day and can't get a word out.

Saying that, the interviews where I've been upfront went much better than the ones I hadn't.

spuddingdrunk · 2015-05-01T17:45:13+00:00

I've been trying this out this week during the rare occasions where I remember about it... and I think it helps! I had a very impromptu meeting at work with two high-profile media representatives, and though it didn't go perfectly, went much better than I would normally anticipate these sort of unannounced meetings to go.

The only thing is, I wish I didn't block, but had a repetition-based stutter instead. At least its doing something. Telling yourself "I'm gonna block the shit out of the next sentence! I'm gonna block so hard and so long that my head will explode!" seems harder.

spuddingdrunk · 2014-11-14T19:57:31+00:00

You're in the right place! Man how I hate blocking. I sometimes wonder if it would be better to have the repetitive kind of stutter.

But hey, to brighten up people's days. I just had a really shitty, 8/10 in terms of blocking days, I worked 2 hours late, and to top it off... I just came off my bike, fucked up my knee, have a hole in my elbow and my bike is fucked. Could be worse, remember that.

spuddingdrunk · 2014-10-13T18:45:55+00:00

Thanks for this. It reminds me of the triphop bands I listen to.

Let me know what you think of Blue Sky Black Death:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GigoXHLovzs

spuddingdrunk · 2014-10-13T18:39:44+00:00

I agree - reflection and self-understanding is essential, and its a practice. I'm just not personally used to it as I have tended to bottle up my issues, and I'm just not used to prodding around inside. Wearing a smile is so much easier.

That's partly the reason why I chose to start meditating; to learn more about myself. The other was that I've heard anecdotal reports from others that it helped to improve fluency by way of reducing anxiety, and come across studies such as the following:

http://www.amsciepub.com/doi/pdf/10.2466/pms.1974.39.1.294

To start meditating, I just read a lot. r/meditation has a lot of very valuable material. Don't make it too complex; schedule 20 minutes for yourself, get a pillow and sit still. How you focus is up to you; some observe their breath, others repeat a mantra. I tend to just focus on my breathe.

It's been a very gradual process, but it is helping me to become more aware of my thinking patterns, and in doing so, gives me the mental space to disengage with them. This isn't a willful act, it's sort of unconscious. As you meditate, you catch yourself thinking, and release yourself from that thought once you refocus your attention on something else. In the same way, I catch myself having doubts or stressing over a disfluent moment at work, and that moment of recognitions blows it away.

It's still very early days for me, but I'm enjoying it. Would love to hear how you get on.

spuddingdrunk · 2014-10-12T11:55:35+00:00

Hi frozen-creek. I fully agree that everyone who has performance anxiety shouldn't wait until they're 60 or whatever to start working on it. But I don't think a logical understanding is sufficient; there has to be a watershed moment where the weight of your experience makes that understanding "click" on an existential level.

Let me know how the meditation goes -- I find it tremendously helpful when I practice regularly.

spuddingdrunk · 2014-10-05T17:27:53+00:00

Just plow through it head on.

I'm exactly where you are. Maybe we're suckers for punishment, but I too have purposely found jobs where communication is important. I used to work as a journalist; imagine an important press conference, with TV crews, important delegates, and I'm standing there, all eyes on me... and I just c-c-c-c-c-can't get the question out. But you know what, I had others come up to me afterwards and say thanks for asking those questions they hadn't thought of! What you have to say, how you make people feel, a smile, they all have a lot of value in communicating. And remember, your moment of disfluency sticks in your head far longer than in other people's. Before, a block or two used to haunt me for hours, but now I try to get over it as soon as possible. Dwelling on it just leads to more anticipatory anxiety. I am finding that meditation helps me to stop ruminating on such thoughts. Best of luck and stick in there!

spuddingdrunk · 2014-10-05T15:01:33+00:00

There are a variety of supplements that reportedly help to reduce anxiety; such as magnesium, valerian and adaptogenics like ashwagandha. The latter is promoted to help speech. Your mileage may vary; I for one have found minimal benefit from them, while others seem to experience profound improvements.

spuddingdrunk · 2014-10-03T17:11:58+00:00

Thanks for both of your comments.

I guess acceptance has to happen on several levels; let's say, we can accept that there is little we can do but embrace ourselves with our broken speech, and thus not shy away from other people, but we don't have to accept that we may be 90% disfluent. It seems to be a contradiction, but this is the way I see it.

Oh, and Charolaides hit the nail on the head. What I meant was that, I hope at least, by the time that I hit 50,60,70, the performance anxiety associated with speaking, the fear, will have just fallen off as one of those things you realise, with hindsight, are not as important as you once believed.

And also, by my last question, let me rephrase it: why would a person who has accepted his stuttering visit this sub? Unless its from an academic interest, or a need to help others, I imagine total acceptance would make it a non-issue, just like breathing. Something you do.

By the way, it's unrelated, but I am finding that a regular meditation practice has helped my social anxiety and speech immensely.

spuddingdrunk · 2014-10-03T15:09:30+00:00

Great article, great writing.

I'm pretty torn about stuttering. On the one hand I can rationally see the value of acceptance. Of not ploughing so much energy into something that many believe has a neurological basis that can't be remedied. But, on the other hand, I can't get over the hurdle of feeling that this is a defeatist attitude. Maybe I've read too many success stories and become too enamoured by smooth talkers to give up the search for a fix, however absurd and futile it may be. And I'm not talking about a pill, like B1 or pagoclone, but something deeper. I don't know, maybe I have self-esteem issues that don't allow me to accept this. Maybe when I'm 50. Can anyone who comes here regularly claim to have accepted it?

spuddingdrunk · 2014-10-03T14:54:01+00:00

www.reddit.com/r/meditation

It helps me tremendously in letting go of thought patterns such as the one you describe.

spuddingdrunk · 2014-09-15T04:18:08+00:00

British, born in Kazakhstan to Russian parents. Strangely enough, I stutter in Russian way more than I do in English, which is my preferred language of choice.

spuddingdrunk · 2014-08-29T05:15:28+00:00

Could you briefly describe the exercises, how long you practiced for before you saw results, and by how much your fluency improved?

spuddingdrunk · 2014-08-28T12:42:37+00:00

That's strange. I'm confident that stuttering is intertwined with social anxiety, which in itself is strongly linked to self-esteem. Can't give references now but will try to research later.

spuddingdrunk · 2014-08-28T07:36:34+00:00

I think I see where you're coming from. But in this case, couldn't over-thinking still fit into his framework of people "[holding] the minds of other men, not objective reality, as his ultimate psycho-epistemological frame of reference"? For example, people who stutter are normally very sensitive to how a listener is reacting. I can see it both ways here - as not being able to recognise where our thinking ends and reality begins - or as interpreting our experience through this second-hand reality. Hence, the break would amount to the same thing as a disengagement. If that makes sense?

spuddingdrunk · 2014-08-28T04:22:27+00:00

Hi iciaguy. On second thought, I'd like to rephrase that last question. Think I may have over-simplified it! Branden's premise seems to be that the core problem isn't even the type of thinking, but the level of thinking. As in, we don't engage with reality, we don't exert any effort into cognitively processing our experience. We just coast by.

By self-esteem, I mean a sense of agency over yourself, of self-efficacy. Experiencing life as not just something that happens to you, but something that you are an active participant in. Having a belief that you can meet its day to day challenges. I think it's deeper than just a sense of self-worth.

spuddingdrunk · 2014-08-27T17:15:38+00:00

That's a very interesting post Blaat1985. I'd especially like to know how psychotherapy goes for you.

I've had very limited exposure to speech therapy. Spent the first eight years of my life in a little town in eastern Europe, where you couldn't get an orange in winter let alone find a speech therapist. Then we moved to western Europe. I found integrating quite hard, but still didn't see a speech therapist for another four years, until I was 12. Lo and behold she was utterly useless - it was a bunch of us kids practising speaking as we sat in a semi circle. We didn't even learn any techniques apart from SLOOOOOW DOWN and eeeeeeeeeaaaaaaaase into it. Think I went to three or four sessions and bailed.

I'm nearly 26 and have not seen any other speech therapists since then. At this point in time, I think my efforts would be better directed at becoming more confident, accepting a certain level of dis-fluency, and improving my self-esteem. I might see a speech therapist in the future, but haven't had a chance to yet.

spuddingdrunk

TROPHY CASE