I have to share this. It’s a story that needs to be told. I hope I didn’t screw it up. It brought tears to my eyes as I heard it, and as I wrote this. I had a great real-time conversation with Shaun. Facebook and email is great, but sometimes, you just have to talk to someone in real time. Shaun was the first SLP graduate student I let “work on me” three years ago. We clicked! It was her first time working with an adult who stutters and it was my first foray into dealing with being very covert.

I had just joined this group called “fluency council”, but I didn’t really want “fluency”. I wanted to begin the journey of finding me, and she got that. That’s why she is going to be a great SLP. She already is. She gets it.

We try to stay in touch, but it had been a while since we had talked over the phone. We treated ourselves to an hour.

She is currently working as a SLP in a middle school, and has three kids who stutter on her caseload. She told me a little about how these kids didn’t know much about their stuttering when she started with them at the beginning of the year. It seems their previous school therapists didn’t have much experience with stuttering. (Surprise, surprise).

One kid was having a particularly rough time, not only with his severe stuttering but his dad’s attitude was not positive. Dad was concerned that son wasn’t trying hard enough, and voiced to Shaun the lament that his son would be doomed because of his stuttering. He wouldn’t get a good job, what would happen to him, and so on. The son was picking up his dad’s shame.

Shaun goes on to tell me that she spoke to dad about this, how his son was picking up his dad’s cues and was beginning to internalize shame himself, despite the gains he was making in therapy. What courage it took for her to say this to dad! Shaun shared with dad her experience working with ME. She told him some of my story. How my early experiences with my dad being so negative and critical set the stage for my very painful journey. Shaun gently encouraged dad to see the value in his son’s stuttering and asked him to consider that among his child’s many gifts, maybe stuttering was one of them. OMG, I was getting goosebumps just listening to this.

One of the gains the kid had made was getting up on stage during a bullying assembly and participating in a skit. He role-played how it might be bullying for a kid to be made fun of for stuttering. This kid was 11 years old. Shaun shared that the whole room, peers and teachers, erupted into huge applause for this kid. It was a shining, special, always remember, proud moment. And his SLP (I had her first!) is a shining star,  for doing that kind of acceptance work with him. The really important stuff at that age.

Shaun told me that she shared with dad MY BLOG and sent him some posts by email to read. The tears were already starting to form when she was telling me this over the phone. She said the dad told her he was reading some of my blog posts. He told Shaun that he didn’t want to be that kind of father who was ashamed of his kid, and that he didn’t realize how his concerns and negativity might really be transferring to his son.

Ready for this? The son comes to therapy one day and brings a letter his dad wrote to him. In this letter, dad tells his son how proud he is of him, and that stuttering makes him special. Of course,the kid is thrilled. I sucked in my breath as I was listening to this and gasped.

So then the kid feels so much more accepting of his stuttering that he tells Shaun that he is OK. She tells him  he doesn’t have to return next year for therapy, that it is his choice. He chooses to continue. He wants to continue working on his stuttering journey.

By this time, tears are streaming down my face. I felt so honored. I am so glad she shared this story. Aren’t you? I asked her to tell the young man and his dad that I said Hi! Please be sure you do, Shaun.

And Dad, if you by chance read this post, I hope you don’t mind. This story had to be told.  Your letter has changed your son’s life. Forget about heroes you see on TV and in the news.  You are the real hero. I won’t soon forget this.  Congratulations!!