DeMystifying Stuttering, Speech and ADHD with Lori

• Hi everyone, this is Lori Melnitsky, your friendly stuttering specialist and person who stutters. Welcome to episode 57 of Stuttering Demystified and Beyond. I am thrilled to have you all here. In today's episode, I'd love to talk to you about the benefits of teletherapy. People ask me about this all the time, whether I think it matters. I am going to talk specifically about people who stutter, people who clutter, people who need help with language. I personally do not see any difference at all. • I am licensed in many states, so I've been doing teletherapy for many years, especially since COVID hit. For those of you who do not know, I see people in New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, Massachusetts, California, Florida, Pennsylvania, over teletherapy. And I saw kids as young as two and a half, believe it or not, when we were all shut down, and I see adults. And when it comes to stuttering, I do not see any difference at all. • Now, if you have a child who's very active and won't do well over teletherapy, there is no guarantee the same thing won't happen in person. I agree there are certain kids, younger kids, who do better with interaction, but when it comes to anybody over the age of six, definitely up to adults, teenagers, don't be fearful of it. And I'm going to tell you why. I'm going to give you a few scenarios of people that I've seen. • One actually is a four-and-a-half-year-old girl I saw for five months over teletherapy. She did great. We modified the activities. Her mother worked with her a lot. She was stuttering pretty severely. After five months, she was a lot more verbal. She was communicative and she's not stuttering anymore. • Another four-year-old, she actually was a little bit selectively muted. She actually did better online because she got a little nervous with the one-on-one interaction. Also, her mother worked with her. She's not stuttering anymore. • I've seen adults who have done intensive programs who are stuttering much less. They've done presentations over Zoom, they've gone on interviews over Zoom, and they've gone on college interviews over Zoom. • I'm being honest with you, and I personally myself, used to do a lot of therapy with my therapist on the phone before the internet was so big. I found that very helpful because I needed telephone practice. • So, there are ways, even over Zoom, of getting your family involved, of getting other people involved. Don't be fearful of it. And I tell you this because a stuttering specialty is very rare and sometimes people are choosing in person because they think it's better. But it's more important, especially under the age of seven where it's a very parent run program. So, I'm teaching you how to work with your kids at home; so, that's very important. • And adults, teenagers, you want to go to somebody more experienced who understands stuttering because otherwise, you waste a lot of time and a lot of money on people who don't know what they're doing. And as we've all gone online, the world has gotten very large, and you have more people who are giving advice that's not too accurate. • So, I'm going to make this episode kind of short and sweet and just realize that it's better to go to somebody experienced and to work over Zoom. There's so many platforms we can interact with. There are words, there are sentences, there are fun games. If you are older, there's so much we can do over Zoom. Don't be afraid. It's better to go to somebody who has experience. • I mean, sometimes we have to remove our thoughts that during COVID, you know, so and so did not like Zoom. But remember, when we were shut down, everybody was spending like hours online. You're talking about speech therapy, stuttering therapy; that's done like once or twice each week. I've been doing this for 30 years, except for certain circumstances, it's much easier, especially for your middle schoolers, your teens, your college students and adults to just go online. www.allislandspeech.com

Episode 48- Tips for Talking on the phone if you Stutter.... by Stuttering DeMystified and Beyond

Hi, and welcome to episode 49 of Stuttering DeMystified and Beyond. This is Lori Melnitsky, your host, stuttering specialist, speech-language pathologist, ADHD life coach, and a person who happens to stutter. In this episode, I want to talk to you about a very personal topic to me.

I want to talk to you about how  you talk on the phone if you stutter. And I'm going to be honest with you, when I was younger, I used to hang up all the time on people I called.  Luckily,  this was before caller ID.

They didn't have cell phones years ago.  If I would call friends and their parents answered, I would hang up. I didn't mean to scare anybody. I was petrified of stuttering. And I didn't want to embarrass myself. I didn't want to be laughed at.  I didn't want people to say, hello, hello, hello if it took me longer to get words out..

It was kind of a very convoluted way of navigating life until I got to the point where I dodn’t wat to avoid. And this was before I really had speech therapy.

I worked for my father from the age of 13 to almost 21. My father and uncle owned a pharmacy  and I began to work for them. I had to answer phones daily .  There  was no way of getting around this. I had to say, hello, Modern Pharmacy. I didn't know who it was on the other end. There was no caller id.  My father stuttered when he was younger, much more so he had to also answer the phone.

I sort of had to put myself in speaking situations.  I had to work at a cash register. I had to answer a phone call. “Hello, Modern Pharmacy”. I had to answer. I had to ask for the prescription number. I had to ask for the date of the prescription. I had to ask for the doctor’s name. And in the early years, I'm trying to think, I don't think I had speech therapy because we didn't know that much about stuttering.

When I got older,  about the age of 20, I think I had some speech strategies. So what did I do? And also, when I was in college, I worked in the admissions office, and at first I would run away from the phone. People didn't know that I stuttered. I think I probably hid it. And all of a sudden someone said,  why is Lori not answering the phones? Uh-oh. Was I found out?

We don't want to let a phone or any technology control how we speak and how we lead our lives. So I hope some of these strategies and some of these tools help you. And again, it is a challenge, but it can be done and I now can make a call without worrying about it. I can say my name. And many of the people I work with are on the phone 90% of the day and have done really. So I want to just leave you with some words of inspiration. I think we kind of all need it, and this is actually by Queen Elizabeth II.

"It is often the small steps, not the giant leaps that bring about the most lasting change." So it's important to really do things one step at a time.

If I can help you in any way, please, my email is Lori@allislandspeech.com. My website is www.allislandspeech.com. I am Lori Melnitsky and I run All Island speech and stuttering therapy online. Have a great day.

In this episode Lori Melnitsky,  stuttering specialist and person who stuttered severely, talks to Chris age 25,  about improving fluency and the MPI-2 Stuttering program.  We had fun, didn't struggle and discussed persistence and grit. Lori@allislandspeech.com

https://www.allislandspeech.com/adult-stuttering-2

In this episode, I talk about ADHD and EF coaching, explaining how it simplifies executive functioning related to learning and ADHD. www.allislandspeech.com https://www.facebook.com/groups/768563444534843/?ref=share_group_link

In this episode I talk about the MPI 2 stuttering program for teens and adults. Listen to fluency specialist and speech pathologist talk about her personal journey as a person who stutters and has treated hundreds of children and adults who stutter. www.allislandspeech.com

Part 2: In this episode Leah continues her heart breaking and heart warming story with ADHD and dyslexia.

Part 1: In this episode, I interview my daughter Leah who talks about her experience with ADHD and dyslexia in high school and college. 

In this episode I talk about the basics of ADHD and why understanding it is so important. Many people with ADHD and executive functioning view themselves as having a deficit as the name implies. However if we explain early on what it is and how we can live with ADHD productivity and confidence improved. 

For more info on coaching please visit www.allislandspeech.com   Lori@alllislandspeech.com 

In this episode I talk about using the word stuttering so it is not a taboo word. There no reason to not use the word.  Lori Melnitsky is a speech pathologist who stutters.  As a young child the word was not heard often.  Many use smooth vs. bumpy instead of stuttering.  Here is my opinion of using the word.

https://www.allislandspeech.com/