Stuttering on the telephone

I started stuttering at the age of four. The stutter affected my life in a massive way, I had a much lower self esteem than the average person, I did not socialise as much as the average person and I had a genuine fear of talking.

 

For whatever reason I found talking on the telephone the hardest form of speech. In a way this is some what strange as I do not have to look at the person who I am speaking to, people who stutter often find it hard to look at people in the eyes when they are talking to them.

 

Before making any phone call there is normally plenty of time to be able to plan what I want to say. In reality this additional thinking time is what was causing the extra difficulties, it gave the negative voices in my head a chance to convince me that I would not be able to speak fluently.

 

I will never forget a day at work when I was eighteen years of age. The position that I held was just a basic admininstration role and I was not required to make phone calls or answer the telephone, that at least was until this particular day.

 

The team leader told the team members, including myself, that he wanted us to start making a few phone calls each day, in his words it was to make the role more interesting.

 

I could not believe it, I felt like I had been shot when I heard what he was proposing.

 

Each member of the team took it in turn to make a phone call, with the team leader sitting next to them, as a way of assessing them. I wanted to just go home but that was not really an option.

 

Eventually it was my turn, all I was asked to do was to phone to find out the date of birth of one of our clients.

 

I was shaking as I dialled the number and the call went really really bad, I stuttered on nearly every word. The team leader was far from impressed and my chances of promotion were shot to pieces.

 

I went home and had a good cry, my life was in a mess, I was in desperate need to overcome this awful stutter.