Stuttering Treatment Guide - Ten Helpful Stuttering Tips

Stuttering Treatment - Guide

Ten Helpful Stuttering Tips

Stuttering tips may not cure your stuttering problem, but they may help you stutter less often or at least make your stuttering less noticeable. Since every stuttering problem is a little bit different, you may or may not respond to all of the tips, or you may respond to some of them but not others.

The idea is to keep working at these stuttering tips so eventually you can feel comfortable speaking to the people you know as well as complete strangers.

Think before you speak. If you stop to think about the best way to phrase something you will benefit from having a clear thought in your head that you would like to verbalize. When you have a clear thought it will be much easier to verbalize clearly.
Talk in a rhythm. You can practice this by singing what you want to say when you are by yourself. If you find a rhythm in which to speak most people will not notice it and you will be less likely to stutter.
Speak slowly and say each word in your head before you say it aloud. When you can imagine the sound of each word before you say it it’ll likely come out much more clear with little or no stuttering.
Start by relaxing. Take a deep breath and count to ten and then begin to speak. The more you allow yourself to think about stuttering the more you will stutter. If you take that deep breath and you begin counting you won’t be able to think about stuttering!
When you are nervous, don’t make yourself look at people in the eye. Many times eye contact will cause a more nervous reaction. Don’t be afraid to look above the heads of a crowd. Just pick a fixed point in the room and speak to that so you don’t feel so much pressure not to stutter.
Talk softer. If you speak softer many times you are so focused on speaking softer that you don’t stutter, or when you do it is not as noticeable to the people that you’re talking to.
Slow down. After you think about what you want to say, don’t be in a rush to get the words out. Allow the words to come out at a normal pace to decrease stuttering.
Don’t be afraid to stop and take a breath. If you feel like you are going to stutter mid sentence take a break, swallow, and then start again. No need to feel embarrassed, just start over!
Make sure you’re breathing when you’re speaking. Many people who stutter have a tendency to hold their breath while talking, which only makes it worse. If you aren’t sure if you are breathing well, see a speech therapist that can help you with breathing techniques.
Read aloud to yourself every day and see if you can find sounds or phrases that are particularly troublesome for you so you can anticipate when you are going to stutter.