by Dhritiman Das

My name is Dhritiman Das. I am presently doing my engineering from Manipal Institute of Technology, Manipal.

After my class 10th board exams ended, I had a lot of time to spend time with myself. I was having a suppressed anger and frustration regarding my speech, a frustration which was simmering at the top and was ready to burst out at any moment. However,with my father and grand-father’ s invaluable assistance I went to a therapist on May14th ,2005 for consultation. That day,he asked me questions about my speech ,analyzed my speech as i could make out with his ever-insightful gaze, and gave me some yes/no questions to answer. I felt that “yes” something could be done about this stammering problem that I have.

The very next day my therapy started under the watchful eyes of my therapist. I also began attending the group therapy sessions. Mind you, before coming for G.T., I had almost never in my life come across any other person who stutters,so the very 1st day was quite a new experience for me. What I experienced had a profound impact on me as a person. I met people with severe forms of stuttering than what i have and yet they were cheerful. I expected the G.T. to be a serious affair but it turned out to be the opposite. All members and the therapist -pulling everyone’s legs, joking (I was the prime target whenever I came for G.T.),and at the same time ensuring that the underlying purpose of therapy and achieving fluency was met. 2 months of rigorous therapy brought out a whole new change in my speech. I was then supposed to test it out outside the clinic-constantly taking risks and applying ROS(Rate Of Speech) rules while talking to strangers to get rid of my inhibitions and develop a whole new attitude.

So, there I went out into the ‘new world’, ready to speak and improve. But the whole excitement got to me. You know the whole feeling of not stopping your breath while speaking, of feeling that smooth flow of air while talking, the perfect coordination of the muscles, the knowledge that u can speak whatever you want to speak without substituting, without hesitating just got to me. I lost all control of my speech, all ROS rules and exactly a month later I began stuttering again. Since then it has been a see-saw ride. I did my exercises, practiced reading , but somewhere down the line I still had not been able to understand the ‘crux’ of the therapy itself like many other members had,thus my speech fluctuated a lot. My class 12th board exams ended last year and then I was a bit stressed out and speech was really bad. I started afresh and my speech somewhat improved, but fluctuations do exist. GT has always been inspiring and fun for me.

These days I go for my therapy regularly. I feel my attitude is my problem(I think I am a little immature in this regard). Whenever someone makes fun of my speech , I just turn around and walk off. I try to articulate as much as I can but forget it at crucial junctures. I ,do, analyse my speech at the end of the day and decide what to do for the next day. I do get a bit upset when I stammer and that affects my speech and mood. Also I have noticed a strange thing that whenever I eat any cold-thing such as ice-cream , my stuttering increases manifold. Has this happened to anyone of you? I am practising a lot. I cannot say my roll no.”19″ in class even now, but i still keep it in mind that I will articulate and look to ways and means to correct it. The journey is still on. The destination is yet to be reached. I shall keep walking.

“THE WAY WE BEHAVE IS THE WAY WE FEEL,THE WAY WE FEEL IS THE WAY WE THINK”