The Duluth Minnesota Chapter of the National Stuttering Association met on Wednesday, September 20th.  There were eleven people in attendance, including 4 CSD students, and two new people who stutter, plus a family member!  This was our first session of the new school year.  We meet the third Wednesday of month Sept-May for two hours.

We started off the meeting with introductions, and then talked about our group, it’s history and purpose, and the personal benefits that we’ve experienced from attending.

We followed this up with a very interesting discussion about stuttering, our thoughts and feelings towards our stutter, and some of the techniques that we find useful.  One of the new members had attended an intensive program at Hollins in Roanoke about 8 years ago – she found it helpful and experienced increased fluency for a few months afterwards before noticing a relapse.  We talked about other techniques (such as easy onsets, prolongations, voluntary stuttering) and discussed how it can be difficult to apply them in the “real world” when we are in a block or stutter.

We also discussed some of the past treatment options that were listed in: http://stutteringhabits.com/stuttering-treatment-history/ ,such as surgery on the tongue, tonsils, and brain! Thankfully, these are no longer common practice. There seems to be a much better understanding and acceptance of stuttering now than there was in the past.

Our next meeting will be on Wednesday, October 18th at 5:30pm on the UMD campus. Please follow our Facebook page for more information – https://www.facebook.com/NSAduluth/