Growing Self Esteem

One day when I was around my early to mid twenties, I went to the hairdressers for my monthly trim. This woman enquired about whether I had heard about the tragic car crash that had recently occured. I hadn’t and she then went on to describe what had happened.

Three young men who were all aged twenty-two, were on the way for an evening in the local public house. One of the men was speeding and was unable to keep control of the car. His vehicle had then careered straight into a large tree, all three of the people in the car had died at the scene.

She continued that one of the men which had died, had worked in the butchers, which was only two doors away from her shop. She described the man in question, which turned out to be a person that I knew, just to say hello to. This was a person I would walk past on the majority of mornings and we would say a quick hello to each other.

During that evening my mind thought about this man. Even though he was friendly, he always looked quite stressed and did not seem that happy. My guess is that he would have perhaps been more care-free and positive had he known that he did not have long to live.

It should not have taken this kind of tragedy to bring me to my senses, but it did. I suddenly realised that we are all terminally ill as we all will die at some point in the future. I am sorry if that is a bit morbid, but it is true. Not all of us will live until retirement age and our lives could end tomorrow.

I have always been a bit of a worrier; mainly about my speech I suppose as I had a speech impediment. I did eventually manage to gain fluency via an intensive one-to-one Stuttering therapy course but even then I started to worry about business; I work for a company which sells patio doors and French doors.

I now have learnt to stop stressing so much – life, I have now learnt, is just too short.

Technorati Tags: stressing, stuttering, stuttering speech impediment

There are numerous reasons why children start to have nightmares. I have two children, both of whom at various stages of their lives wake up crying and upset.

My young son started to have nightmares after watching the film Lord Of The Rings. He really enjoyed watching the film and wanted to watch it on a regular basis and would even re-inact the many battles. The film itself is quite long and he would normally be watching it by himself as his mother and I would be busy doing other things.

I thought about why he may have started to have these type of dreams and believed it was due to this film. I decided to make the time and watched the film with my son. Whenever a person was killed I re-assured him that the people were only acting and had not really died in real life etc. I even made a point of laughing at some of the more gruesome scenes and by making comments like, as if that would ever happen.

Children who stress

My daughter at one point started to stress because she was not in any of the top groups in the different subjects she was taking at school. She felt like she was a failure and that we would not be proud of her. I advised her that we knew she was giving it her all at school and that as long as she continued to try her best that we would always be proud of her.

She did have a real issue to stress about – stuttering. She started to stutter at the age of three and it had a bad impact on her overall self-confidence. I searched high and low for ways to help her to stop stuttering and I am pleased to report that she has now managed to achieve fluency. She is now working in the fields of IT support London and computer support London.

I am confident that with the right motivation that other people will also be able to learn how to achieve total fluency.

Technorati Tags: achieve fluency, stress management, stuttering

Have you a spare five or ten minutes for a chat Mum? Of course Steve, are you OK? Not really this speech impediment is starting to ruin my life. The speech therapy that I have been attending for the last thirteen years is just not working. Is there any chance that you can try to find some other form of therapy for me? Is there any specialist stuttering course out there which could help me to achieve fluency?

What you have read above was part of a conversation that I had with my mother when I was aged 18. As you can no doubt tell I had had enough of living life with this most frustrating of speech impediments and was desperate to find a solution. My parents were superb and searched high and low for a suitable stuttering treatment program but unfortunately they could not ultimately locate the answers that we were all looking for. This happened to be 17 yrs ago; fortunately therapy for stammering and stuttering has improved some what since then.

There are now numerous forms of stuttering treatment available some of which are specialist. A very recent report highlighted that the most popular of these options and also the most beneficial is the one-to-one stuttering course, a course which is run by a former stutterer.

The report also suggested that there is an ever increasing demand for a home-based stuttering therapy program; or what is commonly referred to as a self-help stuttering therapy program. These are where people learn the stuttering cure techniques by watching a DVD, or by listening to an audio book or by reading a booklet or e-book.

With the home based/self-help therapy products there is often an ongoing support service which enables people to interact with the stuttering specialist to ensure maximum results (fluency). It has to be said that this form of continued support is priceless and more often than not should be available free from charge. If this continued support network is not on offer then it would be advisable to find an alternative stuttering solution.

Technorati Tags: fluency, stuttering, stuttering solution, stuttering therapy program

It is believed that as much as one in every hundred adults in the UK have a stammer or stutter. Most of these people will have seeked help at some stage of their life, and will have looked into stuttering treatments and the different forms of stuttering therapy. This is what they may have found:

Traditional speech therapy

Speech therapy is where the majority of people who stutter will start when trying to improve their speech. I went to see a speech therapist for the first time when I was aged just 5 and I continued to attend various forms of speech and language treatment for the next 18 years. All of this therapy and I will still stuttering; it was obviously working then!

The advice I had been given at speech therapy was basically:

speak slowly

take a deep breath before you speak

accept your stutter

I am sorry but that advice is just not good enough.

Group stuttering speech courses

There are now a number of private speech courses that offer stuttering/stammering help and are run on a group basis. In my opinion these are of more value than traditional speech therapy as at least the aim of the course is to eradicate the stutter. Speech therapy is more of controlling and accepting the stutter.

One to one speech courses

There are also one to one speech courses available. I personally believe that this is the best form of stuttering therapy as each person will have their own individual stutter and needs.

Stuttering self help dvd and ebook

For people who would prefer a self help form of stuttering therapy, there are now stuttering dvds and ebooks available. Whichever form of stop stuttering treatment you choose it is essential that you work hard to practice the techniques.

With regards to the practice it is without doubt that the more the merrier is the way to go. If you are looking for available stuttering therapy courses and self-help treatments then The How To Stop Stammering Centre which is based in the UK could be exactly what you are looking for.

Technorati Tags: stammering, stammering help, stammering therapy, stuttering

For people who find themselves fluent, it is exhausting to comprehend what it should be prefer to have a stutter. This article describes a few of the tasks that may prove difficult and irritating for the one that has a stutter, tasks which fluent people simply take for granted.

My identify is Stephen Hill and I am any person who has managed to beat a stutter which had affected my life for eighteen years. Once I was at school, I’d dread the time when I would have to read out aloud in class out of a book. I might rely all the way down to which paragraph I must learn and then I’d look by way of to see which phrases I used to be going to need to say. I hoped that there would not be many words beginning with b,d,v, or g, as I discovered these words particularly hard to say. When speaking in a dialog I would at all times attempt to avoid these words or would consider an alternate word to say. When reading although, it’s a must to read what is written. I had many disagreeable days trying to learn and I am now very completely satisfied these days are over.

Making an attempt to meet ladies and to get a girlfriend proved very difficult and not because I am ugly. My unfavorable mind would always be talking to me stating {that a} explicit lady that I was involved in would not want to exit with someone who has a stutter. If I did handle to date a woman, I would then have the horror of assembly her household and friends. Socialising when you might have a stutter is not easy.

Other areas of life which proved troublesome for me have been:

Ordering food or drink at a bar

Attempting to acquire employment

Speaking on the phone

Answering peoples questions

Introducing people

Introducing myself to a gaggle of individuals, for instance at first of a course at work

As you can tell, it’s quite difficult having a stutter at times.

Go to: Panic Disorder Treatment, Anxiety Panic Attack Symptom and Control Anxiety Attacks

Technorati Tags: speech therapy~remedy, stuttering, stuttering cure~remedy~treatment

There were a range of things which impacted upon my overall self-confidence and self-esteem levels as I grew from being a young child to a man. These included:

A bald patch on my head

A speech impediment known as a stutter

A weight problem, I was basically too fat

I am rather vertically challenged at only 5ft 4

Certain people I met would be quite nasty and would try to make fun of me. I tried really hard to ensure that these nasty people did not affect me however I must admit that there were many a time when I would shed a tear. Life at times was quite tough especially where I worked at the egg donation clinic.

Aged 22 I decided to do something about this pathetic way of living – I needed to become a real man – I needed to become strong and far more care-free. I decided I needed a big change in attitude and started to read books about life and about positive thinking etc.

These were the things I had to take on board:

Who cares what other people think about you? As long as you like and have respect yourself nothing else really matters

You need to start to like yourself

There are various things about your person, you do not like but which you can not change. You therefore have to start accepting these things and realising that maybe there are other people in life who are more unfortunate than you.

Start respecting life and yourself

Do not accept second best in life

Be happy

I tried hard to implement this advice and even though it was not easy to change, I knew I had to. It is now time to make the most out of my life; I have a lot of catching up to do – there is certainly no time for worrying. I have also managed to eradicate the stammering problem.

I now sell upvc doors for a living and I am a website content copywriter on a part time basis; my life is now much happier overall.

I hope this article will be of benefit to the people who read it.

Technorati Tags: Be happy, Do not accept second best, positive thinking, stuttering

So you have realised that speech therapy is doing very little to improve your fluency and have now decided to seek an alternative form of stuttering therapy, but what options are available for people who have this form of speech impediment?

By the age 18 I could not take anymore and decided to fight back against my stuttering demons. I felt let down by the system, by the lack of understanding of the problems that I was having to face on a daily basis, surely there must be some treatments for stuttering out there that is better than this.

This was seventeen years ago, before the start of the internet revolution. I originally visited a number of libraries in my quest to find a cure for stuttering; unfortunately this did not provide me with the answers that I was looking for. I then looked in my local yellow pages and also went to see my local doctor but again it was as if there was not a person or therapist which specialised in the treatments for stuttering. Why is there no-one who really cares out there?

With the aid of the world wide web it has now become a lot easier for people to find suitable therapies for stuttering and stammering. They are able to find the latest therapies for stuttering by doing a simple search on one of the major search engines, such as Google, I sure wish that this had been an option for me all those years ago.

Options in stop stuttering therapy include speech therapy courses run by people who have managed to overcome a stutter. There are courses on a group basis however by far the most sought after course are those that are on a 1 to 1 basis.

Attending a speech course is not suitable to everyone and for people who are unable to attend such a course there are a number of powerful and beneficial self-help stuttering products on the market.

Technorati Tags: speech course, stutter, stuttering, treatments for stuttering

There are millions of people from all around the world who are trying to stop smoking cigarettes. This article gives free tips on how you can kick the habit and to stop smoking those cancer sticks once and for all.

I started to smoke due to the fact that I had a stuttering speech impediment which badly affected my confidence. Starting work at 16 at the local leaflet printing company was quite difficult and I believed that I needed “my fags”. My second job was at a DVD authoring company; they however had a non smoking policy! I now needed to quit.

When I was a teenager I clearly remember one of my teachers introducing a swear box at school. Such a simple idea had a big impact on the school and at the same time taught me a huge lesson.

Over the last number of years we have seen regular government advertising campaigns to convince people to quit smoking. These are becoming more and more shocking and hard hitting, however people still do not listen.

So what do the majority of people care about? How much cash they have in their pockets is the answer to this questions; rather sad I know. Despite ever increasing tax raises on cigarettes people still continue to buy them. So here is the concept of my plan – which is quite simply to keep a written record of how much money you are spending, or wasting, on smoking each week. Then times the figure by fifty-two and that will be the amount you spend on cigarettes per year. Just imagine if you were to be offered a pay increase to the same amount as you were wasting on these cigarettes? This is the reality as that is the increase in available money you would have per year. Now think about what you would buy with that additional disposable income.

Going back to the swear box idea from before, it can be just as effective in any stop smoking program. It is likely that you will bow to temptation and every time you smoke one cigarette you put the equivalent cost of one whole packet in the swear box as way of punishment.

Technorati Tags: quit smoking, stop smoking, stuttering, swear box

I am a person who has often felt unhappy with the hand of cards that I have been dealt; especially when going through the teenage years. One person actually mentioned that I walked around like I had the weight of the world and its problems on my shoulders.

For those of you who may be pondering what issues I had at the time here is a brief description. I developed a speech impediment when I was just a young boy. Stuttering put a huge dent in my confidence and made me withdraw into my shell.

I had a weight problem which was mainly caused by comfort eating when I was depressed. For whatever reason I have a small area on my scalp, the size of a small coin, where I am basically bald – this has been the source of amusement for many of my work class mates and work colleagues in the past. I was always the shortest person in the class and for a male I am well below the average height at five-foot four. I have struggled in my career originally for a DVD replication company however I am now doing well offering  affordable pet insurance.

When I was aged about 18 I enjoyed an evening out with one of my best friends called John. John was one of the people I had always been jealous of for many different reasons. On this particular evening we were both fairly drunk and John had became quite emotional. During our conversation he told me that his father was an alcoholic and that at certain times when he arrived home worse for wear that he would hit his mom. He was very worried about this and was not sure what to do.

I have learnt that we all have problems and that in most cases there is always people worse off than ourselves. I now try to think in a much more positive way and am very happy with the cards I have been dealt.

Technorati Tags: alcoholic, happy, happy person, stuttering

I remember when I was growing up, my parents used to become vey annoyed with me when I stated that I could not do my homework or could not do other things I had been asked to do.

They would advise me that I would be able to achieve any goal that I had via hard work and by having a positive attitude. The word, can’t, does not exist in my vocab Steve, I sometimes find certain tasks difficult however always believe that I will be able to succeed, my father would say.

He ensured that I learnt this most important of lessons by keeping on nagging it to become a part of my natural character. It has helped me to achieve many things and to also overcome some of the issues I had in my life.

School and employment

I was not the brightest student at school and as previously mentioned would often say that I could not complete the work through my lack of belief in my own ability. I actually worked my socks off and eventually left school with some very good grades; my parents were very proud. I continued this success into my work life and became a successful upvc front door salesman as well as offering poster printing. 

Stuttering

From the age of four I had suffered with the speech impediment known as stammering or stuttering. By my early twenties I had had enough of this struggle and went about trying to overcome the stutter. My parents were amazing and were always there in a supportive way to ensure that I kept up the practice.

I did, after a huge amount of work and dedication, manage to overcome this most annoying of speech impediments, this enabled me to have the freedom and confidence to say any word that I wanted to – this was a huge relief as you can no doubt imagine. Life is now a lot easier!

Technorati Tags: my lack of belief, proudest achievement in my life, stammering, stuttering, superb support, working and practicing very hard