We had a fantastic Chapter meeting last evening, and a unique one in that we had many first timers – welcome Joe, James, Jesse, Emma and Mark! Here was the technical breakdown: 12 attendees and 10 of those were PWS! SLP grad student Eugene also came to get a first hand taste of listening to people who stutter share their stories. Kristel K. did a fantastic job facilitating the meeting this month – it was really an engaging group.
1) Job interviewing is always a lively topic, especially for young people who stutter. Besides the obvious challenges, as people who stutter, we are faced with an additional challenge, or perhaps an opportunity, depending on how you look at it. Rivkey S. shared her experience in deciding to ‘advertise’ while on a recent interview, and expressed how right away she was in control of the situation and had set the initial tone of the interview, something that can be rather powerful. And generally speaking, we agreed that this authenticity in ourselves may indeed be one of the most ‘powerful’ tools we may have at our disposal, and not just for interviews.
2) We discussed the idea of how much we ‘should’ be challenging ourselves when it comes to accepting our stutter and generally being open about it. First timer to the Brooklyn chapter Joe G. shared his experiences with how he likes to pick and choose his daily challenges, and the importance of not being too hard on yourself when you decide to not openly advertise or stutter during ‘all’ situations. This is an important concept that many people who stutter can identify with. Carl H, suggested that there really don’t have to be any rules to this and that it may change for each person on a daily basis.
3) We talked about support from our family, and the lack of it in some situations. Jesse S. explained how his family cares so much for his well-being, but as most of us know, there can be limits to support when it comes to fluent speakers in understanding stuttering, and daily challenges we are faced with. That’s why we have the NSA! Yipeee! Emma A. shared her experience when visiting her grandma who has a hard time with her hearing, so Emma is forced to speak in a slow rate with her, which in return may have some prolonged benefits in managing her stutter – almost a little speech therapy session. So Emma will continue her visits because she’s an awesome granddaughter, but also for her own personal well-being.
4) Another meaningful topic that came up was the idea of people’s reactions to when we stutter openly, which can range drastically, and perhaps even could be a bit entertaining at times. It seems that we have limited control, if any, in shaping the outcome of other people’s reactions to our stuttering, but we agreed on the benefits of maintaining eye contact, and also maintaining a confident appearance – perhaps even smiling while stuttering. Who says we have to be so serious all the time? These ‘reactions of others’ naturally led the conversation to shift gears a bit and focus on the relevance of ‘our reactions’ to our own stutter, which seemed to be the more valuable issue at hand, particularly because we do have control over this.
This was truly a great evening and we hope to see everyone, especially the first-timers, again! We have some really cool social outings planned for the end of the summer and for the upcoming fall, where you’ll be able to meet more awesome people who stutter, so make sure to stay in touch with the NSA and come back in September. Definitely come back in September. Don’t even think about not coming, that would be silly!