The David McGuire Course has attracted a great deal of publicity over the past year as well as attracting a great number of people who stammer who wish to take 'the road to freedom'. I recently spent two days observing the course in Bournemouth and can see that 'the road to freedom' is a long, uphill journey.

I attended the course with a former client with whom I worked for some time. We had concentrated on block modification and achieved some success. However, this client wanted total fluency so we talked about the McGuire course, which he decided to try.

There is no doubt that the course is exceptional. It is extremely intense and demanding. It seems to work well for some people but I feel that anyone considering attending should be very clear about what they are letting themselves in for. It is no easy ride.

The first two days involve intense drilling in the breathing technique along with a checklist of things the recovering stammerer must do. This checklist includes many things familiar to speech therapists such as voluntary stammering, kinaesthetics, block release, cancellation, eye contact etc. However, it also includes some things we would not, perhaps, use: the abnormal costal breathing, mantra chanting and non-stop eye contact.

What amazed me most was the dedication and sheer effort the students and past graduates displayed. Hour after hour they sat in two circles, with past graduates facing new students, going over and over the checklist. The use of the technique is constant - no one is allowed to revert back to old ways. There is tremendous support offered but occasionally the pressure seems to be too much for some to bear, resulting in the occasional emotional outburst. It is not unusual for one or more students to leave after the first day. If this happens the student is entitled to a full refund. In fact no one left the Bournemouth course.

Perhaps the most interesting part of the course for me was talking to a variety of past graduates. Once students have graduated from the McGuire course, they are entitled to attend future courses as often as they like on payment of a minimal fee. Graduates are also given a comprehensive list of telephone numbers of other graduates to enable them to obtain support after the course. Graduates attending subsequent courses can either use them as a refresher course, or it they are confident enough, help new students.

I spoke to people who had completed the course 18 months earlier, five months earlier and one month earlier. It seemed clear that 'freedom's road' was far from easy for them.

After completing a course many people suffer relapses. They are advised that this is likely to occur and are encouraged to prepare for this. If a relapse does occur, it is up to the individual to put in the hard work and practice required to get back onto the right road. Some people I talked to had suffered numerous relapses but had not given in.

I was amazed how hard people were prepared to work and how brave they were in facing their fears and stepping out to make their 50 contacts (talking to 50 strangers on the street).

I has to ask - is it worth it? The resounding answer, for most people, appears to be yes! The taste of fluency after years of stammering is enough, it seems, for most people to keep up the fight.

As someone who has never suffered the intense embarrassment and frustration these people have clearly gone through, who am I to argue? I came to the conclusion that if people want to take up this challenge, they should be able to do so. It must be the individual's choice.

No one should be pressurised into taking this approach as it is not the right one for everyone. The 'stammer more easily' approach still works well for many people. I would have to say that, as a listener, I enjoy listening to someone who stammers in a relaxed way more than listening to the initial mechanical fluency of many McGuire graduates. The, often noisy, breathing pattern is initially very distracting to the listener. This does become more mellow as graduates gain experience and become successful at using the technique. However, some continue to sound somewhat abnormal.

And what about the assertiveness factor? It is important to be assertive. It is something I have often worked on when running courses for stammerers. However, I felt that some of the McGuire graduates seemed to have become oblivious to others around them as they focused on and battled with their own fluency. Some had turned away from family and friends in their personal pursuit of fluency. I sensed that others wanted to punish fluent speakers for past reactions they have experienced. This aggressive behaviour is worrying and needs to be addressed.

I was very impressed by the course but I do have a few reservations. I was made very welcome by David and his colleagues. They are very keen to discuss and share their ideas.

The course is adapting and developing and as therapists we should be prepared to observe and share our ideas. It is very easy to be critical, and even dismissive, but we must ask ourselves whether we can offer the same degree of fluency on the courses and from the therapy we provide.

Who wants total fluency? Seeing the number of people in Bournemouth (60), obviously quite a lot of people.

In my view, freedom's road must mean a freedom to choose. If someone wants complete fluency and is prepared to battle for it., the McGuire course may be the correct choice. Equally, people should be able to choose to be content with their stammering.

Note: the terms 'freedoms road', 'graduates', and 'students' are those used by David McGuire.

Published in 'Signal', journal of The Royal College of Speech and Language Therapists' Special Interest Group in Disorders of Fluency, under the title 'The road to freedom'.
(Reproduced here by kind permission - Webmaster.)

See also: Costal Breathing index page.