Fluency (Stuttering)

What is stuttering?

Stuttering affects the fluency of speech. It begins during childhood and, in some cases, lasts throughout life. The disorder is characterized by disruptions in the production of speech sounds, also called "disfluencies." Most people produce brief disfluencies from time to time. For instance, some words are repeated and others are preceded by "um" or "uh." Disfluencies are not necessarily a problem; however, they can impede communication when a person produces too many of them.

In most cases, stuttering has an impact on at least some daily activities. The specific activities that a person finds challenging to perform vary across individuals. For some people, communication difficulties only happen during specific activities, for example, talking on the telephone or talking before large groups. For most others, however, communication difficulties occur across a number of activities at home, school, or work. Some people may limit their participation in certain activities. Such "participation restrictions" often occur because the person is concerned about how others might react to disfluent speech. Other people may try to hide their disfluent speech from others by rearranging the words in their sentence (circumlocution), pretending to forget what they wanted to say, or declining to speak. Other people may find that they are excluded from participating in certain activities because of stuttering. Clearly, the impact of stuttering on daily life can be affected by how the person and others react to the disorder.

Many treatments focus primarily on physical techniques. At Speech Time, we take a holistic, individualized approach.

We address the physical aspects of stuttering - as well as the negative emotions and thoughts that can accompany it. In short, we approach stuttering from every angle- mind, body, and spirit. Our treatment draws extensively from avoidance reduction therapy, acceptance and commitment approaches, and rational emotive behavioral therapy.

While treatment plans are customized for each client, our integrated treatment model focuses on:

• Speaking with greater ease
• Building confidence while speaking
• Minimizing negative thoughts and emotions