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Welcome to The Dynamic Stuttering Therapy blog

August 21, 2009 By 4 Comments

Welcome to The Dynamic Stuttering Therapy blog. Here I will tell you my views of what stuttering is and the best way to treat it. My journey toward understanding stuttering has been a long one. Like many of you, I’ve hit blind alleys and dead ends as I looked for ways for overcoming stuttering. The first time that I ever had a person who stutters come to me for therapy was over 40 years ago when I first began working as a Speech Clinician. As an undergraduate, I had been taught that stuttering was a problem of personality dynamics. It sounded good, but I had no idea of how to change someone’s personality, so I looked to the textbooks for advice and in the meantime received a Master Degree from Boston University.  I tried everything: stuttering modification, desensitization, airflow, Gestalt therapy, fluency shaping and more. Unfortunately, I did not find that any of these approaches were the solution my clients’ desire to speak normally. During these years I met some people who were devastated because they stuttered. Although, at the time, I did not know how to successfully treat stuttering, I could not accept the common belief that my role as a clinician was to help my clients learn to live with stuttering. I became determined to find a way to help people who stutter speak freely. For the past 20 plus years that has been one of the main priorities in my life.

Today, I am a Board Recognized Specialist in Fluency Disorders. I have treated well over 2000 people who stutter of all ages. I realized many years ago that stuttering had many facets that had to be related. This lead me to look at it as a problem of how the speech production system functions. Through the years, with the help of my clients, researchers, other professionals in many fields, a bit of optimistic stubbornness, and faith, I am happy to say that I have unraveled many of the mysteries related to stuttering. Now when people come to me because they stutter, I do not have to guess what goals they need to achieve. Therapy is not a question of trial and error. I know for a fact that stuttering is treatable, and I can clearly see the cause and effect relationship between how the speech system functions and the ability to make both stuttered and fluent speech.

Today I am able to help people who stutter discover that they are capable of speaking fluently with ease and comfort.  I have the joy of watching so many of my clients gain confidence and enjoy speaking. I know I am looking at stuttering from a different perspective than most people. It is the perspective you will read about on my blog. I think you will find it enlightening. I look forward to your comments and hope you will enjoy mine.

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  • http://stutterrockstar.wordpress.com/ Pam

    Hi Barbara,

    Your ideas are certainly different from what I have heard abou the goals of therapy. I have stuttering since age 5, lived covertly for many years,and finally tired of that about 3 years ago. I have been working on effective communication, which for me includes stuttering.

    One thing that you wrote in one of your initial posts caught my eye:
    that you had clients coming to you with the desire to speak “normally”. I have always hated the concept of “normal” ! For me, stuttering is normal. Its what I do. Do you agree that for some people who stutter it is normal, just as fluent speech for the fluent speaker is normal.

    Interesting, huh?

  • http://stutterrockstar.wordpress.com/ Pam

    Hi Barbara,

    Your ideas are certainly different from what I have heard abou the goals of therapy. I have stuttering since age 5, lived covertly for many years,and finally tired of that about 3 years ago. I have been working on effective communication, which for me includes stuttering.

    One thing that you wrote in one of your initial posts caught my eye:
    that you had clients coming to you with the desire to speak “normally”. I have always hated the concept of “normal” ! For me, stuttering is normal. Its what I do. Do you agree that for some people who stutter it is normal, just as fluent speech for the fluent speaker is normal.

    Interesting, huh?

  • http://stutteringonlinetherapy.com/ Barbara Dahm

    Hi Pam,
    I agree that effective communication is the ultimate goal for all people. By allowing yourself to stutter, it is most likely that you allowed yourself to speak more freely without the fear of stuttering. I think that is great. Doing this is not in contradiction of what my clients do. However, they don’t do voluntary stuttering. I don’t recommend that because for most people it requires thinking about stuttering and how to stutter. It requires attention to speech. The principle of DST is to give up thought about how to speak either by trying to be fluent or trying to stutter.

    The word “normal” can have many interpretations. Certainly some people have the tendency to produce stuttered speech. This is what they are used to doing. However, all people change a lot of things that they are used to doing. Change is part of life. I wouldn’t say that stuttered speech is “normal” for human communication. That isn’t a quality judgement. It is a fact. Some people prefer to do what they’ve done as much as possible in their life. Others are interested in making changes. I help people who stutter to communicate without effort and their speech happens to sound normally fluent. Is that a bad thing?

  • http://stutteringonlinetherapy.com Barbara Dahm

    Hi Pam,
    I agree that effective communication is the ultimate goal for all people. By allowing yourself to stutter, it is most likely that you allowed yourself to speak more freely without the fear of stuttering. I think that is great. Doing this is not in contradiction of what my clients do. However, they don’t do voluntary stuttering. I don’t recommend that because for most people it requires thinking about stuttering and how to stutter. It requires attention to speech. The principle of DST is to give up thought about how to speak either by trying to be fluent or trying to stutter.

    The word “normal” can have many interpretations. Certainly some people have the tendency to produce stuttered speech. This is what they are used to doing. However, all people change a lot of things that they are used to doing. Change is part of life. I wouldn’t say that stuttered speech is “normal” for human communication. That isn’t a quality judgement. It is a fact. Some people prefer to do what they’ve done as much as possible in their life. Others are interested in making changes. I help people who stutter to communicate without effort and their speech happens to sound normally fluent. Is that a bad thing?