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zondag 6 december 2015
Happy birthday
Monday I turned 24. My mom turned 57. Yes we have the same birthday :-). I'm very lucky to share a birthday with my mom.
For me turning 24 also means 19 years of dealing with my stuttering. So I used the day to reflect on my life so far.
For 19 years I've had a lot of self doubt, a lot of fear of people knowing that I have a stutter. I was scared to be vulnerable. I didn't like it when people saw who I really was, someone struggling every step of the way to feel good.
Every time I had a stutter I would feel so ashamed. And for what? For being who I am?
I've had those thoughts for most of my life. Turning 24 made me realise that I've spend most of my life thinking about what others would think of me. I've wasted hours, days, months.
The last few months I have started to change that.
It's a hard thing. Changing thoughts you've had for 19 years.
When I was little I always told myself that my stutter would be gone by the time I turned 20 or 25. I told myself I would work so hard and it would be gone by the time I had a job. I would be able to make phonecalls, talk to people and do all of it without stuttering. I would even pretend to work as a secretary and make fake phonecalls when I was little. I loved it. And now I absolutely hate it ...
When I was younger I would pretend to be a grown up, I would pretend that my life would be so much better than it was at that point. I would actually dream about not having a stutter. All I wanted was to be normal.
Now I've realised that I'm probably never going to be completely stutter-free. And that's not what I want either. I want to be able to have conversations, phonecalls and do it all with stutters. But with comfortable short stutters instead of blockages. My goal has changed from being stutter-free to being comfortable with it. Right now, that's all I want.
I can not count all of the negative experiences I've had so far. All of the bad phonecalls where I couldn't even say a word. Or the conversations where I felt like my blockage was actually cutting all of the air off.
But I can not forget about all of the good moments. The happiness I have felt when I had a succesfull phonecall or conversation. Or the happiness that comes from a good session at therapy. And let's not forget the speaking assignments at school that made me feel on top of the world.
In 24 years I've overcome a lot of hurdles. I look back at some moments and think 'Why was I even stressing about that?' 'Why was I scared to make a stutter?' ... The negative moments are nothing compared to the good ones. I know that there are a lot of negatives ones to come, I'm still struggling with a lot of things but I have so many people in my life supporting me and helping me ... I know that I'm going to be all right. I'm only 24 years old.
To all of the people who have a stutter I just want to say that you are not alone. You can do whatever you set your mind to. You are more then just someone that stutters. You are a fighter because you've never known anything else. All you've had to do is fight. And that is exactly what makes you different. It's not the stuttering, it's the fact that you are not someone that gives up. You're going to reach your goal, one way or another.
Love,
Natasja
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