Speech Therapy
Hi! We are students at the University of South Carolina’s Master of Speech Pathology program, and we are curious to hear more about your therapy experiences. If you participated in group and individual therapy, which did you find to be more helpful? Also, are there any techniques that you learned in therapy that you continue to receive benefit from today?
Thank you for your time,
Diana and Lauren
I have tried many treatment programs and other modalities for helping me with my chronic stuttering but the one that helped me the most was a 3 week prolonged speech intensive that I did many years ago. Although I relapsed I have been able to do “booster programs” that have been able to reinstate the fluency, Having said that, relapse is the biggest nemesis of stuttering treatment and most people suffer from it to some degree. Although I have tried many lengths of course over the years I have found that the 3 week intensive gave me the best results. I have found that the shorter the treatment program the harder it is the make the changes in both speaking and thinking behaviours that are required for fluent speech and the quicker the relapse. The treatment of adult stuttering is not really the domain of a generalist speech pathologist. It tends to be the domain of specialists who have an in depth understanding of stuttering and its psychological side and have the skills and training to run an extended day intensive treatment program. These cannot be offered by most speech pathologists. Group therapy does tend to get batter results and is more cost effective. Since my original therapy I remained part of a self help group set up to help people maintain the skills that they learned in the group treatment program. Doing weekly speech practice in the support group has become part of my life and allowed me to live a mostly fluent life.
As stuttering wasn’t accepted at home, they didn’t take me to an SLP. And once I did, I was very unfortunate with these two. But later in life I found the most amazing SLPs, but by that time, I was happy with where I am, but learned a great deal from them.
Stuttering treatment can be a smörgåsbord with manh different things that, together, can be the key. For me it was a combination of claiming my space. Pausing, vary speed and volume of my speech, and articulate, together with mindfulness and NLP, music and theatre, yoga and massage. So find out what would be the combination for your specific client, and think out of the box. 🙂
Stay safe and keep them talking
Anita
The combination of private and group therapy is what I’d choose. As stuttering is so much more than speech itself. We carry different backpacks, full of cultural issues, life experiences, and other backgrounds. So all these need to be addressed. Group therapy gives us a chance to realize we’re in this together, support and practice together.
Also, are there any techniques that you learned in therapy that you continue to receive benefit from today?