I could go to bed with the worst parts of my day still happening in my head. The speaking moment was over, but I kept replaying it. Then I would start imagining what the next day might bring.
A word I couldn't say. Feeling humiliated at school. Something I wished I had done differently. I could lie there with tears in my eyes while nobody else knew how much I was still carrying.
I don't know why I originally started to stutter. This is the pattern I knew afterward: looking back at what hurt and looking ahead for the next thing that might hurt.
I started with the way I spoke to myself
I had become very good at attacking myself. I failed again. I can't talk. Nobody will like me. Those were thoughts I lived with for years.
My early interruption was, “It's too early in the day to hate yourself.” I called it a crutch. I used it in the morning and at night. It wasn't a huge promise that everything was suddenly fine. It was something I could say to interrupt what I was already doing.
That self-talk work took time. I didn't have to wait until I loved everything about myself to begin it.
Could I remember something else that had actually happened?
In the self-talk video, I asked the listener to remember a time their speech was a little better than expected. Then I asked what they had said to themselves afterward.
Maybe the first thought was, why can't I do that all the time? But was there also a quieter thought of having done it, of having got the words out? I wanted them to notice that too.
I was asking for an actual moment. It did not have to be perfect speech. The point was to give a better experience some space instead of replaying only the painful ones.
A person challenged my explanation
In a group call, a participant said he wanted to understand why a memory made him feel bad. He distinguished understanding that feeling from simply going over the painful event again.
I disagreed strongly during that conversation, and he kept explaining the distinction he meant. I want to preserve that disagreement accurately. I was describing the time I spent replaying humiliation and expecting more of it. He was asking how to understand his reaction to a memory. We did not reach an agreed method during that exchange.
There was loneliness in it too
I would have loved somebody who had gone through this and could talk with me about it. Someone who understood why the day still hurt after the talking was over. I have described wanting that as much as wanting help with fluency.
Learning kindness toward myself was part of the work. So was making some room for enjoyment and for relationships. I wanted more in my life than getting through a conversation and spending the rest of the night punishing myself for it.