Stuttering Informative Speech

“My hands felt sweating, my heart was pounding faster than usual and I was very nervous to talk.” I’ve never been that nervous to speak then that day that I started stuttering at a gas station. I went to a gas station near Albizu University and I was getting ready to start stuttering but I got nervous all of a sudden. At that moment how people who stutter feels when they have to talk in public. I went inside the store and immediately looked at the cashier to see if he seemed like a nice person. I was nervous that he was going to be rude if I start stuttering which is probably a fear that people who stutter have, that people will treat them rudely for stuttering.

After being in the gas station for five minutes, I decided to buy muffins that had no price on them. I went to the front counter and asked the cashier “d-d-do you k-k-know how muuuuch this m-muffin cost?” I used repetition and

prolongations to ask how much the muffin cost. I noticed the cashier got serious when I started stuttering and finished my questions before I had finished because he understood what I wanted to ask him. I ignored him and still proceeded to ask the question. He replied, “ It’s $2.14”. I stuttered “t-t-two fourteen?” and nodded yes. I took out my money and paid for that expensive muffin. I wanted to ask him another question to make the conversation longer, therefore; I asked him “w-w-where is there a n-n-neeeearest M-m-mcdonalds n-n-near by?” The cashier gave me the direction of the nearest McDonalds. I said to him “T-t-haaank you” and exited the gas station.
Although the cashier got serious when I started stuttering, he was nice enough and didn’t make any facial expressions that would make me feel bad about my stuttering. I also noticed that a few customers that were nearby and talking stopped talking the moment I started stuttering. When they suddenly stopped talking as soon as I started talking, it made me more self-conscious of my speech because I was the center of attention. I heard the customers whisper but I am unsure if they were talking about me.
Individuals that stutter gets nervous when speaking, they overthink what they will say, and their heart rate goes up when speaking out loud.

We have learned in class that individuals that stutter, do not stutter when they are alone, singing, speaking to animals. This confirms that stuttering is based on emotions and speech can be affected more when they are feeling stressed out and emotional. Individuals that stutter often feel frustrated because they don’t understand why they can’t stop stuttering and they feel embarrassed when they do start stuttering. They know what they want to say and how they will say it but when the words try to come out of their mouths, they start producing repetitions, and/or prolongations. They can also have secondary behaviors that physically are more noticeable to the listener. They can also feel pressure from the listeners because the listener might misunderstand what they are trying to say, they ask them to repeat, finish their sentences and they can also feel that the listener is becoming impatient and waiting for them to finish their

sentences.
As we have learned in class, language tends to be in the right hemisphere where your emotions are. Individuals that stutter are nervous, shy, self-conscious and emotional people. Stuttering is more often found in males than female. I have always felt empathetic towards individuals that stutter because they cannot control their stuttering at times. They tend to try really hard to stop stuttering but putting that stress on themselves, makes them stutter more. This project was very helpful and it gave me the chance to put myself in their shoes and now I understand them even more why they always feel nervous when they talk or why some would avoid public speaking. It’s a scary world with a lot of judgmental people and it is very stressful for the individuals that stutter.