Battle. you try to manage it all the time. do you also still have the same kind of mentoring or assistance that you did as a child? do you maintain that as an adult? well, i ve been happily, luckily able to help mentor some other people and help advise other folks. i m always happy to do that. and i m on the board of the american institute for stuttering. i really like to give back, because i was a kid myself who went through this and i know what a difference it makes when people take a little time out to help a youngster. i know what she was saying, it s true we all stutter differently but people tend to react the same way. they say calm down, slow down, it s all right, take your time and that kind of adds to your anxiety. i think for me the breathing exercises help the most. i thought that was very accurate in the king s speech. so what would be your recommendation on the receiving end to people who are listening to someone who is stuttering and
Get up. why not, it s a chair. no, that is not a chair. that is that is st. edwards chair. people have carved their names on it. listen to me. listen to you by what right. because i have a right to be heard. i have a voice. joining me now, two guests who are shedding light on this often misunderstood condition. in new york the executive director of the american institute for stuttering and in washington, clarence page, a well-known columnist for the chicago tribune who was battled strurting for most of his life. clarence, let me begin with you. when you see colin firth s depiction of the stuttering, when you saw that, could you relate to that? i not only related to it, i was sitting there wincing, you know, silently saying, come on, get it out, get those words out because i ve gone through it. that whole profile i think was very typical of a lot of us who
They re not quite sure what to do? and as you said, sometimes their reaction might make the stuttering even worse? yeah. well, one thing that people need to do is to try to just be patient. my parents learned to just be patient until i got the words out and just speak to me as if there was nothing wrong. try to reduce the anxiety in this situation. but the therapy definitely helps to work with people who can help you to coordinate all of the complex mechanisms involved in speech, including breathing, voccing accords, the mouth, the hearing, everything is involved. and if one thing is out of sync, suddenly those words get stuck in the throat. so it s and a lot of it s practice. just keep on talking and keep on practicing and things will work out. syndicated columnist clarence page and the director of the american institute for stuttering, thanks so much to both of you for your time. appreciate it.