Stammering, Its Cause and Cure - Benjamin Nathaniel Bogue (short books for teens .TXT) 📗
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This will explain why the stutterer or stammerer can talk without difficulty to animals or when alone—there is no self-consciousness—no conscious effort—no thinking of what is being done.
Another of the peculiarities of stammering is that the stammerer in many cases seems to be able to talk perfectly in concert. This has long baffled the investigator in this field, no reason being assignable for this ability to talk in connection with others. The baffling element has been this—that the investigator has assumed that the stammerer talked well in concert, whereas a very careful scientist would have discovered the stammerer to be a fraction of a second or a part of a syllable behind the others.
You have doubtless been in church at some time when you were not entirely familiar with the hymn being sung, yet by lagging a note or two behind the rest, you could sing the song, to all appearances being right along with the others.
When you talk over the long-distance telephone, the voice seems instantly to reach the party at the other end of the line, yet we know that a period of time has had to elapse to allow the voice waves to move along the telephone wire and reach the other end. The elapse of time has been too slight to be noted by the average human mind and the transmission seems instantaneous. This is what happens in the case of the stammerer who seems able to talk in concert—he is merely a syllable or part of a syllable behind the rest, all the while giving the impression nevertheless, that he is talking just as they are.
There are many other individual peculiarities which can be described by almost every stammerer. These different peculiarities are more numerous than the cases of stammering and it would be useless to attempt to discuss them in detail. I will take up only two as being typical of dozens which have come under my observation in twenty-eight years’ experience.
One stammerer explains his difficulty as follows: “I find I am unable to talk and do something else at the same time. For instance, I have difficulty in talking while dancing, while at the table or while listening to music. If, for instance, I wish to talk to any one while the Victrola is being played, I unconsciously cut it off.” This is a case where the stammerer finds that all of his faculties must be concentrated upon a supreme effort to speak before this becomes possible. In other words, he has not yet learned to control sufficiently the different parts of his body so that they may act independently. This might be termed a lack of independent coordination.
In the case of another young man, he found himself unable to control the movements of his muscles. In describing his trouble, he said: “At one time, when I was talking particularly bad, I was out with some other fellows driving our car. I started to talk, found it almost impossible and noticed a sharp twitching of the muscles of face, arms and limbs. Try as I might, I found I could not control these movements and in another minute I had steered the car into the ditch and wrecked it. And now,” adds the young man, “although father has a new car, I am never allowed to drive it!”
Here was a case where the spasmodic action of the muscles had gotten so far beyond control as to make the ordinary pursuits of life dangerous to the young man who stammered. These spasmodic movements were always present—he told of one occasion when he was in a barber’s chair being shaved. He attempted to say a word or two while the barber was at work upon him, with the result that he lost control of the muscles of face and neck, causing the barber to cut a long gash in his neck.
This was, of course, an abnormal case of spasmodic stammering, evidencing extraordinary muscular contractions of the worst type. In practically every case of stammering some such peculiarity is evident, resulting from the inability of the stammerer’s brain to control physical actions.
Paradoxical as the statement may seem, it is nevertheless true that one of the symptoms of least seeming importance marks one of the most dangerous aspects of both stuttering and stammering.
This is the alternating good-and-bad condition known as the Intermittent Tendency or the tendency of the stutterer or stammerer to show marked improvement at times.
This seeming improvement brings about a feeling of relief, the unreasoning fear of failure seems for the time to have left almost entirely; the mental strain under which the sufferer ordinarily labors seems to be no longer present; there is but little worry about either present condition or future prospects; the nervous condition seems to have very materially improved, self-confidence returns quickly and with it the hope that the trouble is gone forever or is at least rapidly disappearing. With these manifestations of improvement come also a greater ease in concentration, a greater and more facile power-of-will and an ambition that shows signs of rekindling, with worth-while accomplishments in prospect.
Hope now burns high in the breast of the stutterer or stammerer. They go about smiling inwardly if not outwardly, happy as the proud father of a new boy, at peace with the world. The sun shines brighter than it has for months or years. Every one seems much more pleasant and agreeable. Things which the day before seemed totally impossible seem now to come within their range of accomplishment. Such is the feeling of the confirmed stutterer or stammerer during the time of this pseudo-freedom from his speech disorder.
In his own mind, the sufferer is quite sure that his malady has disappeared over-night, like a bad dream and that freedom of speech has been bestowed upon him as a gift from the gods on high.
The higher the hopes of the sufferer and the greater the assurance with which he pursues the activities of his day, the greater is his disappointment and despair when the inevitable relapse overtakes him.
For disappointment and despair are sure to come—just as sure as the sun is to rise in the heavens in the morning. The condition of relief is but temporary, and will soon pass away to be followed by a return of his old trouble in a form more aggravated than ever before.
Fate seems to play with the stammerer’s affliction as a cat plays with a mouse, allowing him to be free for a few hours, a few days or a few weeks as the case may be, only to drag the dejected sufferer back to his former condition—or, as is true in many cases, worse than before.
THE RECURRENCE: With the return of the trouble, the bodily and mental reaction are almost too great for the human mechanism to withstand. Hope seems to be a word which has been lost from the life of the stammerer. The fear of failure returns with an overwhelming force mocking the sufferer with the thought of “Oh, how I deceived you!!”; the mental strain is exceedingly great—so great, in fact, that it seems as if the breaking point has almost been reached. The nervous condition is alarming, the sufferer noting in himself an inability to work, to play, to study or even to sit still. An observer would note the stammerer or stutterer in this condition fingering his coat lapels, putting his hands in his pockets and removing them again, biting his finger nails, constantly shifting eyes, head, arms and feet about. If at home, the sufferer in this condition would probably be seen walking about the house, unable to read, to play or listen to music or to follow any of the accustomed activities of his life. If in business or in the shop, he would be noticed making frequent trips to the wash room, to the drinking fountain, to the foreman, picking up and laying down his tools, looking out the window, shifting from one foot to another, all of which symptoms indicate an acute nervous condition, brought about by the return of his trouble.
At this stage, the stammerer’s confidence is hopelessly gone, so it seems, and this feeling is accompanied by one of depression which finds an outlet in the expression of the firm belief and conviction on the part of the stutterer or stammerer that the disorder can NEVER be cured, by any method, although just the day before the same sufferer would have insisted that his stuttering or stammering had CURED ITSELF and left of its own accord.
These conditions, both at the time of the so-called improvement and at the time of the recurrence of the trouble, will appear in greater or less degree in the case of every stutterer or stammerer whose trouble is of the intermittent type.
THE DANGERS OF THIS TENDENCY: This period of recurrence is accompanied by almost total loss of the power-of-will, a marked weakening in the ability to concentrate, and if it does not result in insomnia (inability to sleep) puts the mind in such a state as to make sleep of little value in building up the body, replacing worn-out tissue cells and restoring vital energy.
The chief danger, however, resulting from these periods of temporary improvement, is the belief that it instills into the mind of the sufferer and more frequently into the minds of the parents of stuttering or stammering children, that the trouble will cure itself—a fallacy greater than which there is none.
Stuttering and stammering are destructive maladies. They tear down both body and mind but they have not the slightest power to build up. And until a strong mental and physical structure has been built up in place of the weakened structure (which results in stammering and stuttering) a cure is out of the question.
The spell of intense recurrence of either stammering or stuttering which follows a period of improvement, often marks the period of transition from one stage of the disorder into the next and more serious stage. This transition, however, may not be a conscious process—that is, the sufferer may not in any way be informed of the fact that he is passing into a more serious stage of his trouble save that after the transition has taken place, he may find himself a chronic or constant stammerer and in a nervous and mental condition much more acute than ever before.
Dr. Alexander Melville Bell (father of Alexander Graham Bell, inventor of the telephone), who, before his death, was a speech expert of unquestioned repute, discovered this condition many years ago and in his work PRINCIPLES OF SPEECH speaks of it as follows (page 234):
“Often the transition from simple to more complicated forms of difficulty is so rapid, that it cannot be traced or anticipated. Perhaps some slight ailment may imperceptibly introduce the higher impediment or some evil example may draw the ill-mastered utterance at onee into the vortex of the difficulty.”
This Progressive Tendency, which we shall hereafter call the Progressive Character of the trouble in order to distinguish it from the Intermittent Tendency, is present in more than 98 per cent, of the cases of stammering and stuttering which I have examined and diagnosed.
True, there are many cases, the apparent or manifest tendencies of which do not indicate that the disorder is becoming more serious, but nevertheless this condition is no indication that the trouble is not busily at work tearing out the foundation of mental and bodily perfection.
SUCCESSIVE STAGES: Stuttering may be
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