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 

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