Children Who Stutter Offer
Advice to Others -- Be Patient
Take the time to listen, they say
Sunday, April 24, 2005
Karen Farkas
Plain Dealer Reporter
-- Children who stutter don't have a problem -- it's the people
around them who do.
Friends need to be patient and let them complete words and finish
sentences.
Teachers need to encourage them to make presentations and participate
in class.
Speech-language pathologists need to realize they will never
be 100 percent fluent.
Parents need to support them.
These were the reaffirming messages at a workshop on stuttering
Saturday at Kent State University.
Dustin Blaylock and Ryan McDermott, two teens who stutter, said
they accept the condition and wish others would, too. It will
not stop them from college, a career and success, they said.
"This is who I am, and I am comfortable with it," said
McDermott, 18, of Westerville.
Parents, speech-language pathologists, adults who stutter and
youths attended the workshop, sponsored by Friends, the National
Association of Young People Who Stutter.
Lee Caggiano, a New Jersey speech-language pathologist and mother
of a 21-year-old son who stutters, co-founded the organization
in 1998 to provide support for children and their families.
Caggiano told the group her son was 9 before she found other
parents of children who stuttered. She realized a group was needed
for youths and their parents after attending a convention of 300
adults and two children with her son.
Parents said when they realized their child stuttered, they
had no idea what to do. Their first inclination is to try to "fix" it.
"Parents are angry, desperate and have a great fear of
the unknown," said Sue Skrobacs of Brunswick, who realized
her son Ralph, now 14, stuttered when he was in kindergarten. "I
was alone for two years trying to find help."
The child may be the only one in his school district who stutters,
a situation faced by Dustin, 15, of Medina. He said when he was
young he was confused about why he didn't talk right and thought
he was the only person who stuttered.
When he got involved with Friends he found new friends and gained
self-confidence.
"I think if people do not take the time to listen to me,
it's their loss," he said.
McDermott, who may speak in polished, fluent sentences, then
pause for up to 30 seconds before he can say a word, said he is
annoyed if people finish his words or sentences.
Marilee Fini of Highland Heights, a speech-language pathologist
who stutters, said she still faces that problem but children today
who stutter face less of a stigma and have more information.
"I had a feeling of being isolated and alone," she
said. "I did not meet anyone who stuttered until I was 22,
and it changed my life."
Caggiano said children who stutter should never be deterred
from communicating.
"The stutter does not define the person; it happens to
be the way they talk," she said.
© 2005 The Plain Dealer. Used with permission.
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