I’ve said recently that my stuttering hasn’t been too bad the past two years since the new job began. But I do still stutter. I always will. I’ve come to accept this.

So what am I stuttering on lately? Or what conditions seem to make it worse? I’d say unpreparedness.

I had to think for a while about this since things move slow enough — or maybe I’ve just figured out better how to control them — so that I’m rarely unprepared. This mostly happens in a meeting when I’m asked about something completely off-topic. The good news is that I work with people who are patient. So if I need to take a moment to say, “let me think,” they usually do. And then I can look something up on the computer or rack my brain trying to recall what the issue was.

I’d say it only gets worse if there’s a peppering of questions by others for me. Then usually what happens is that I’ll stumble for answers as I’m trying to think. Then while I’m thinking and speaking and stuttering, I’m also forgetting the other thing that they need to know. So a few questions in, and I’m already trying to backtrack and fix a mistake I said two minutes ago.

Just writing about this is making me feel stressed! I can feel it unfolding on the phone on a conference call or in a room with a lot of hard stares.

Adding to the stress is usually the slow realization, during questioning, that I may have completely missed something or screwed something up royally. Or that forgetting about something that has now come back to bite me. Stress goes up, my breathing gets way out of whack, and I’m stuttering all over the place.

Breathe.

But like I said. I usually try to stay organized and prepared so that I don’t have to go through an ambush interrogation. The stress stays at a nice low level. I can breathe. I can let my words out slowly. I can focus on the content versus whatever small stutter I do encounter.

Since I work at a manufacturing plant, there’s a need to make sure everybody is aligned every day on what’s going on with production. To that end, there’s a morning meeting. I usually try to sit in on these, just to listen what’s going on, if there’s any issues I can help with (my responsibilities are more long-term, not daily) or if there’s a problem that keeps happening that I can try to wrap a project around.

I’ll often need to talk about project work or something we are trying to do, engineering-wise, during the upcoming year to address long-standing issues.

My usual approach is to listen to the first half of the meeting and then think if there’s something I should add. Oddly, I don’t rehearse this in my head. I just think of what it is, and that’s about it. The last part of the meeting the supervisor will go around the room and ask if the participants have anything to add.

When I was a kid, this was obviously the worst part. Knowing they’d come to me, and I’d have to say yes or no or whatever. But during these meetings, after having done them for so long, I’m not afraid. There’s a feeling that I have to share what I know. I’m comfortable with the group. Everybody is patient with me. We usually laugh during these meetings, so nobody is too uptight.

When they call my name, I always — always — remember to take a deep breath. Then I take another shorter break and start talking. I try not to think about saying the words. I focus on the content. Make sure that I’m being clear and specific with my comments. Because usually if I have to add something, it means that it’ll impact a few people in the room, on the floor, or with regards to production going out to customers.

If there a few items, I’ll have written them down in my notebook. Then after each is brought up, I’ll just continue down the list.

Have I stuttered before during this meeting? Oh, heavens yes. It happens fairly often. But nobody is bothered by it. I’m not, either. I either just power through the word, or take a quick break and try again, making sure to take a breath. I have found that focusing on breathing really helps me not only relax, but with speech in general.