Adèle Fuller explains how she stopped playing a game of 'Hide and Pretend' with her son Gareth's stammer, and learnt to acknowledge his suffering and needs.

I am very proud of my son. He is in his early twenties and for the past two years has been working very hard to confront his stammer and to learn ways of coping, with the help of his speech therapists and support group.

I say the "last two years", but that is a serious understatement. What I really mean is "all of his talking life". Gareth, like many people who stammer, has had to cope with the numerous difficulties in 'his' process of communication. Communicating to most people means 'being able to say whatever they wish with the full co-operation of their mouth, tongue and voice'. In fact, for most of us the words just 'slip out'. A common cliché used every day, would be "Oh I'm sorry, the words just slipped out before I knew it".

I have learned with the help of Gareth and the information I have received from the BSA that words rarely 'slip out' for people who stammer, taking part in a conversation or making a request can be likened, I am told, to going through an assault course or dodging in and out of a mine-field.

Like a great many parents, I suspect, I wish that "I knew then what I know now". I hadn't any real knowledge about stammering when Gareth first learned to speak and very soon after began to stammer.I did consult my GP when my son was three and again just prior to his starting school at five. The advice then was to "wait and see" if his speech became fluent, as it probably would. It never did, but what then occurred was very unhelpful and frustrating for Gareth.

The family became 'used' to Gareth's speech. His teachers and peer group became 'used' to it. My son's stammer was so much part and parcel of 'him' that it became 'invisible' to everyone except Gareth who continued to suffer.

Even when I began to acknowledge Gareth's frustration seriously, which was in his early adolescence, others would say "I've hardly even noticed he stammers", or even "I didn't know Gareth had a stammer". This comforted me and I tried to play the game of 'Hide and Pretend' with Gareth. I didn't realise that (a) my son had to cope with my 'denial' as well as his stammer, and (b) that Gareth was making a huge effort to dodge around stumbling words in order not to stammer. If Gareth had fractured his leg and had it in plaster then we would 'all' have noticed. As it was 'none' of us did and he felt isolated, misunderstood and very frustrated.

What I am going to explain next may be very surprising. It is to me. I have been employed in the caring professions for the last twenty years, first as a nurse and then as a social worker working primarily with troubled adolescents and younger children. It wasn't until two years ago, when I became involved in a conversation with a student at my place of work that I knew I had not 'heard' Gareth and had not understood his frustrations.

My own frustrations of being a parent and in particular to a son who interrupted my conversations, became moody and even very rude, were at last falling on 'hearing ears', and my colleague looked at me and said, "I have a stammer and I think I understand why your son behaves as he does". To cut a very long and painful story short, this was my 'watershed' and the point at which I was actually helped to understand the frustrations - pain, anger and fear that my son had been experiencing since early childhood.

Now, and a big jump later I can say positively that Gareth and I have a relationship which is based on understanding and part of this is my acknowledgement of Gareth's own 'personal needs'. I am now able to help other professionals in their awareness of the pain and frustrations of children who stammer.

It is 'ironic' that I actually carry out play therapy with a ten-year-old boy who stammers and I was able to pass on valuable information to his carers and the person responsible for finding foster parents for him. It is sad that I just couldn't be as useful to my son at that age, but positive that knowledge and insight can be valuable, it's always better 'later' than 'never'.


From the 'Helping Stammering Pupils Project' insert in the Summer 1993 issue of 'Speaking Out'.