1 year of therapy !!!

This week it has been 1 year since I started therapy again. I have to say, I'm so glad I made the decision to go back. 

Some people believe that therapy is a waste of money, or they say that it doesn't help. 
For me it has been a big help. Without it, I wouldn't be where I am today. 
During this year we worked on a lot of things and in this post I want to go over it a couple with you. 

My first big problem was my self esteem. Well, the lack of it. My stuttering made sure that I was always doubting myself. I always felt like I wasn't good enough. I didn't feel comfortable in my own skin. Things like ordering something in a restaurant or even going to a store were really stressfull for me. I just knew that I would make a fool out of myself. Stuttering really gets into your mind and produces negative thoughts. You sometimes don't realise that all of the things you are so afraid of, might not be so scary. You get stuck int his negative circle and it's really hard to get out of.

Thanks to therapy I'm feeling much better. My thoughts are more positive and I just feel a lot better. Bad days don't have so much influence on me anymore. I'm not saying that I never have negative thoughts (I'm only human) but overall they are less frequent and less bad. I try to be as positive as I can and I try to get myself to do scary things like ordering by myself in a store or picking up the phone and calling clients/company's without making excuses. 

I was also very scared to let people notice that I stutter. I always pictured their reactions, them looking at me funny, rolling their eyes, telling me to talk faster ... 
I was ashamed. My goal was to be able to make stutters without feeling that shame. I wanted to make stutters without have stress about what people would think. 

In therapy we watched a lot of video's of other people stuttering. It made me realise that my stuttering wasn't bad and I shouldn't feel ashamed. Nobody should. People react more positive to it than you would actually think. Now I feel like I can make a stutter and I can say 'whatever, I made a stutter, it's a part of me'. I think this is also a result of my self esteem growing. I don't want to hide it anymore. And I can not tell you how good that feels.

Another big thing to work on was  the tension I had when I made stutters. Because of the fact that I was scared to make stutters, I would build up a lot of stress. See, there are different kind of stutters. You have stutters with a lot of tension where you can feel it in your neck/shoulders/cheeck/face, you have stutters that have a small amound of tension where you can feel it but you don't feel like you have to push your words out and there are stutters with almost no tension where you feel like you can go in the stutter with a certain amound of relaxation in your voice and body. My stutters where the kind where after a day of work I would come home with so much tention in my body, I could sometimes barely even move my neck because of the stress I had build up on my muscles. 
Have I told you that stuttering is more than just not being able to talk fluently? 

Thanks to Leen I found some methods where I'm able to talk with a relaxing feeling. I said it before but making extentions like 'NNNatasja' or making repetitions like 'Na-Na-Natasja' really releaves my stress. 
I can go into my stutters without any type of stress. I can not tell you how could it feels. 
It was never my goal to get rid of my stutters, it was my goal to be able to talk fluently even with stutters. Thanks to these 2 small methods I'm able to do that. 

Last but not least, my reading. God that was just so bad. I couldn't even read one sentence without having 4 or 5 blockages that lasted about 20 seconds, sometimes even more. I had so much trouble with reading, it took me 4 minutes to read 4 sentences. You think I'm kidding? I can actually show you the evidence because Leen filmed it during my first session. I hated reading out loud. I hated it so bad and every time I had to do it I could just picture myself blocking on every word.

Tuesday I read the same text again that I read during my first session. It took me 4 minutes to read 4 sentences then, now it took me a little above a minute to read 4 alinea's of 4 to 6 sentences. I can not tell you how could it felt to accomplish that. By using extentions and repetitions I am able to read a text more fluently. The hardest part is always the first sentence. Once I'm past that I read fluently, like a normal person. I'm so happy that I accomplished that. I practise my reading a lot and now I actually enjoy it. 

Ofcourse we worked on a lot more but these are the 4 biggest things that, in my opinion, needed work. Leen has really helped me this year. I'm so greatfull for that. 
Nobody should tell you what to do or what not to do but in my opinion, therapy is worth giving a try. It can really help you deal with your stutter. 

I know this was a long post but I just wanted to share this with you because a part of my is a little bit proud of what I accomplished this year and the progress I made so far. And I think I have a right to be. I still have a lot of work to do (trust me) but accepting my stutter is something that I've never been able to do. It feels pretty amazing.

Last but not least.
HO HO HO merry Christmas everyone.
I hope all of you have a great Christmaseve and great Christmasday tomorrow.
Spend it with the people you love and make it a great one. 
I love you guys, thank you for all the support after my previous post. It really is appreciated. You guys are amazing. 

Much Love,
Natasja xxx

Little recap of the past 2 weeks

Due to a lot of work at my job and at home I haven't really got the chance to post in these 2 weeks, which I apologize about. I'm not the kind of person that can post something real quick and not think about it anymore. When I post something it's related to me and my situation. I always try to think of something where others can get some support or help from.

For this post I'm going to do a recap of the past 2 weeks. How has my stuttering been? Has it been worse, better or has it stayed the same as before?

I can say one thing, in these past 2 weeks I have answered more phonecalls than normally in 1 month. It's been very busy at my job due to the fact that a lot of things are changing for our clients, in a good way ofcourse, and the fact that I'm just 8 new contracts away from hitting my yearly goal. So the pressure is on. 

With all of this comes a lot of stress and pressure. Something that, eventho I had a lot of work during college, is a little bit new to me. It's a different kind of stress or pressure. As I have said before, stress influences my stuttering a lot.

I have so say that I'm pretty happy with how I have been handling incoming phone calls lately. I'm still having small stutters or small blockages but I'm controling them more and I'm not thinking about them so much anymore. Ofcourse this can change from day to day and I know that I will have days where it will be more difficult. 

Overall, incoming calls are going good. Can they be better? Ofcourse, but Rome wasn't build in a day and neither is handling your stuttering. 

When it comes to phonecalls that I have to make myself, it's a little bit harder. 
First of all, when you make a phone call it's common to say your name and the company, now that is already something that is very hard for me. Then there is the part where your message has to come across loud and clearly to the person on the other line. Now imagine already stressing out about saying your name ... how in the world will you get your message across? The stress is already build up so high in the beginning that it's hard to lower it during the rest of the call. 

For me, those calls are definitely a work in progress. So far, they are still a disaster. I can't get myself to actually make a phone call where I don't have any problems with just introducing myself. It's frustrating because I want to be able to do my job like everyone else would.
All I can do is keep practicing. 

Talking in general is going pretty good. Not without stutters or blockages but with more relaxed stutters or blockages. There isn't so much pressure on my troath anymore which makes it easier to talk a little bit more fluently. 
This also fluctuates day to day. 
I sometimes try to make voluntarily stutters during my speaking. This isn't easy for me because it sometimes feels a bit unnatural. 
A voluntarily stutter is when I can feel a stutter coming up and to avoid a blockage or a real stutter I will actually make a stutter myself. For example, instead of having a blockage on my name, I would say 'Na-Na-Natasja'. I'm still making a stutter but it's more relaxed, shorter and it won't end up in a blockage.

To get rid of the unnatural feeling, me and Leen have speaking assignments where I have to tell a short story or just talk about something random. While I'm doing this I would have to make voluntarily stutters. That helps to make it feel more natural and more common to me. 
Outside of the therapy it's very hard for me to do this but I do try to slip a voluntarily stutter into my speaking sometimes. 

Last but not least is my reading. Yes, I also have trouble with reading. When I just began my therapy again, I couldn't even read one sentence out loud without stuttering or having blockages on pretty much every word.
I have been practising a lot on my reading and it's been going better.
It's also something that me and Leen work on a lot. 
By also making stutters on a voluntarily basis I can take the pressure off certain letters or words just like with my speaking.
Now I can actually read a short story fluently without to many blockages or stutters. Trust me when I say, that took a lot of effort and a lot of work. 
Just like with my speaking, there are good and bad days. Some days I can read a whole story without even having to make a voluntarily stutter and other days it's very hard to even start the sentence. 

Overall, I'm pleased with how I'm doing so far. Seeing as I'm under a lot of stress it could have been a lot worse. I try to take a lot of energy out of the good days so that the bad ones can be forgotten quickly. 

The key words are patience, work and having faith in yourself.



Love, 
Natasja