Stuttering

According to scientific and doctoral studies, the cause of stuttering goes back in time to a traumatic incident early in one’s life, in which the stutterer either doesn’t want to speak, can’t speak, or is afraid to speak. Similar to the development of a phobia or any neurotic behavior, it is possible that a traumatic event might have been the initial cause leading to the problem, but often years pass before an event occurs which actually triggers the presented trouble.

Dave Elman’s method for the relief of stuttering involves the use of hypnoanalysis. While in trance, the subject is taken back to the time period at which the stutter began, a process called age regression. This age regression hopefully provides the stutterer with a new understanding to a very old misunderstanding and relieves the problem, or at least improves the situation. Elman also correctly states that there is often more than one event, which has been compounded one, on top of the other. When this is the case, each incident must be relived in order to gain a complete relief of the stuttering challenge.

Within my own practice, I have been approached by clients seeking relief from stuttering, and so, I have done extensive research myself and quite a bit of successful work with a number of different clients suffering from their stuttering. Below is the bulk of my findings on stuttering.

Interestingly enough, the common acknowledgment about stuttering is that suggested by Milton H. Erickson, “stuttering is a form of aggression” (The collected papers of Milton Erickson: volume IV, pg. 92, 1980). Milton Erickson states that stuttering is primarily an affliction associated to aggression within the individual directed toward others. This aggression generally stemmed from one or more occasions during childhood in which the child wanted to say something and was either afraid to speak or unable to for some reason, in turn developing the stutter.

With some individuals, Milton Erickson would redirect the aggression toward some harmless entity such as the spacing of trees from the edge of a walkway. With others, he directed a relearning of the language with either infantile type sounds, or nursery rhymes. In such a case a mental age regression to early learning periods succumbs, and a proper relearning takes place.

Now, stuttering or stammering has hampered the lives of many throughout time, and all too often those seeking help have met with one disappointment after another. Before speaking further of a cure, it might be useful to mention more of the causes, and reasons behind this painful inability to express oneself clearly.

I would first like to point out that no one is born with a stutter, and that speech is something that is learned. Most people begin learning to talk by hearing sounds, and eventually uttering meaningless sounds until they are able to form words.

Now we all know that some toddlers learn to walk before others, the same goes for learning to talk. As for the reasons, there are many but I'll present but a few.

Some children are early learners while others prefer to wait. At times these later learners become overly pushed by the primary caregiver(s), and due to this, develop an aggression causing a type of hyperventilation to their breathing rhythm producing an irregular talk. These children I'm sorry to say can thank their primary caregiver for his/her patience. (Sorry but I am merely repeating the words of those scientific minds whom studied this intensively before me.)

Others learn this stutter at a later period in early childhood, most often due to a fright. We must remember that what might seem silly to an adult could be quite terrifying to a small child. The views, due to sizes and understandings of experiences are quite different. I remember when I was a child here in Canada, and it would snow so much that if I stood there I'd be buried. Nowadays the snow hardly ever reaches my knees, yet the average snowfall is about the same.

So how does this fright affect the speech of a child? Simply put, imagine a frightened or anxious child wanting to get something out, but being afraid to utter a word due to some possibly awful consequence, the tension building up, the pain, and fear causing irregular breathing, then wanting, and trying to spit it out. The child keeps trying to start the word of choice, concentrating on its beginning, but something is holding this poor child back. With time this memory becomes buried because as human beings, it is our nature to move away from discomforts.
Unfortunately, our unconscious, that storehouse of information that knows when to breathe, and remembers things, holds onto those awful memories keeping them from our conscious minds. With time, the tensions mount and this stutter, or stammer becomes a learned habit, a habit coming from an irregular-breathing pattern due to repressed memories. The reader can learn more about repressed memories through our symptom resolution page.

So it is said that a stutter is a compromise between the simultaneous desire to express an idea and to inhibit it. Stuttering is also therefore said to be a form of aggression against society and people. I don't mean to say that a stutterer is intentionally angry, not at all, but that of a buried memory of an obligation to speak when he/she wasn't able to, has caused an inner frustration. This in turn has eventually led to an irregular breathing pattern which when compared to others, has caused the stutterer to become confused about speech and his/her own relationship to the process.

Now where do we start to change this painful process. We begin with breathing. The observed breathing patterns of stutterers have been measured as extremely irregular, and so we begin with deep breathing exercises, to learn a steady relaxing rhythm. Every good speaker has a rhythm, and the stutterer will be surprised to find that, if they began to sing along with their favorite songs, there will be no stutter as he sings. Why is this?

The first reason is because of rhythm, and secondly, because we tend to concentrate on what comes next rather than first. That is to say that if you place your emphasis on the last part(s) of the word, the beginning simply slides out.

The stutterer can also practice whispering to himself, and this singing and whispering begins to repattern the train of speech.

The other thing those who stutter need to do is slooow down their speech. This person is generally overly anxious about talking for too long a period to say what they have to say, and so he/she tries to say it faster, in turn causing a more pronounced stutter, and taking longer to say what he/she wishes.

The stutterer will also find to her surprise that if she faced a mirror and took a nice deep relaxing breath, then tried to stutter intentionally, he/she won’t be able to stutter. It's quite amazing, you might like to try it, that is if you tend to stutter.

Now what about those repressed memories, what do we do about them? How about hypnosis, and hypnoanalysis for memory recall? Thousands of people have instantly lost the ability to stutter with a single session. How is this possible, by simply taking the stutterer back to the initial experience, which began this learned process of stuttering. With hypnosis we can access the unconscious, then remember and provide a new adult understanding to the deeply seated memory of that inner child. With a new understanding, the old fear becomes transformed, and new learnings lead to changes.

For some people the thought of going back into memories of early childhood is far too uncomfortable. Stutterers can also re-learn fairly quickly to talk smoothly with a few sessions of hypnotherapy, combining language learning techniques developed by Milton H. Erickson; to help the person relearn the art of speaking in the most natural fashion. We can incorporated metaphor, to provide the subconscious with a new understanding and freedom to speak freely and smoothly,
and time distortion techniques, to accelerate the learning process in a relaxed fashion which provides for a compounding of the relaxation effect learned during the hypnotic trance.

For those interested in having their hypnotherapy at home on their own terms, I have specially designed a set of hypnosis recordings to eliminate ones troubling stutter. Just click this link, products for health and healing, and scroll down the page to "Stutter No More, program number 304", or you can click this next link to a page very much like this one with the difference of a complete elaboration to the programs I have prepared for those seeking help, the stop stuttering with hypnosis program, and you can even have a look at the newest adjustment to the program our Stop Stuttering Super Set which also has a special offer for clients who have purchase the program prior to the date of this program.

For those who wish to learn and help themselves, below are many of the best sources you will ever find on stuttering, complete with authors and many with ISBN number. Many of these books are hard to find, but most of the links provided should be helpful, for others visit your neighborhood library.

Transforming Therapy: A New Approach to Hypnotherapy (1989) (Gestalt Hypnotherapy)- Boyne, Gil: ISBN# 0930298136

Clinical Hypnotherapy (1968)- Cheek, D.B. & LeCron, L.

How to Hypnotize Yourself and Others- Copelan

Clinical Hypnosis: Principles & Applications (1975)- Crasilneck, Harold B.

Hypnotherapy- Elman, Dave

Collected Papers of Milton Erickson - I
-The Nature of Hypnosis and Suggestion (1980)- Milton Erickson
Collected Papers of Milton Erickson – II
-Hypnotic Alterations of Sensory, Perceptual and Psychoanalytical Processes(1980) – Milton Erickson
Collected Papers of Milton Erickson - III
-Hypnotic Investigation of Psychodynamic Processes (1980) – Milton Erickson
Collected Papers of Milton Erickson - IV
-Innovative Hypnotherapy (1980) – Milton Erickson

The Practical Applications of Medical & Dental Hypnosis (1981)- Erickson M.H. ISBN# 0876305702

Life Reframing in Hypnosis - Vol 2 – Lectures- Erickson and Rossi

Mind Body Communication in Hypnosis, Vol 3 - Lectures (1986)- Erickson w/ Rossi ISBN# 0829018050

Creative Choice in Hypnosis - Vol 4- Lectures (1992)- Erickson and Rossi

Hypnotism- Estabrooks, George

Conversations with Milton Erickson, vol.1 (1985) - Haley, Jay

Handbook of Hypnotic Suggestions and Metaphors- Hammond

Wisdom of Milton Erickson - Vol 2 (1985)- Havens, Ronald

The Art of Hypnosis- Hunter, Roy

Professional Hypnotism Manual- Kappa's

Clinical and Experimental Hypnosis- Kroger and Lippincot

Therapeutic Metaphors for Children and the Child Within- Mills, Joyce & Crowley, Richard

An Uncommon Casebook: The Complete Clinical Work of Milton H. Erickson (1990)- O'Hanlon, WilliamISBN# 0393701018

Hypnosis and Hypnotherapy with Children 3rd. Edition (1996)- Olness, K. & Kohen, D.

Hypnosis: Theory, Practice & Application (1950) pgs.176- Rhodes, Raphael H.

Trance & Treatment: Clinical Uses of Hypnosis (1987) pgs.382- Spiegel, Herbert: ISBN# 0880482648

Clinical Hypnosis with Children- Wester, William

Medical Hypnosis: Volume I The principles of hypnotherapy. (1958)- Wolberg Lewis R.

Medical Hypnosis: Volume II The practice of hypnotherapy. (1959)- Wolberg Lewis R.

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