Clare Bailey, our Divisional Director of Healthcare Professionals, has spoken out about her stammer after finding the impact of the pandemic has made it harder to control. She hopes sharing her story will encourage others to be more open, and realise it doesn’t matter if you do stammer.

“I have a stammer - many of you may not know it, and it doesn’t define me, but it is a part of me.

I can’t remember ever not having a stammer. One of my early memories - I must have been about five - was going to a health worker with my mum to have my speech assessed, and having to read out the same passage of a book over and over.

I hid it throughout my time at school, petrified of ever being asked to read aloud (so much so I would even try to move desks). I was ashamed of the connotations it brought of a ‘stammering idiot’, the perception that if you have a stammer, you can’t be clever and something else is probably wrong with you.

Most people with a stammer will admit to avoiding certain words, having different conversations in their head than out loud as they can’t always communicate the words they want to.

You don’t grow out of a stammer, but as I got older, I found ways to control it. Small things like thinking about what I’m going to say, and taking my time, help, as do bigger things like good mental health, exercise and getting enough sleep.

It’s taken a long time for me to find the confidence in myself, and realise it doesn’t matter if I stammer. It can even be quite comical at times.

There are a few reasons why I’ve chosen to speak about it now; I recently watched a documentary, ‘I Can’t Say My Name’ from Felicity Baker, a BBC producer who has a stammer, which made me cry as I really connected with her reflections. I’ve found it more difficult to keep my stammer in check during the pandemic. And at the end of a recent MS Teams meeting I found myself asking a new colleague, privately, if they had a stammer. They did, and were surprised when I revealed I did too.

That conversation showed I was not the only one finding it more difficult to control my stammer due to the impact of the pandemic, such as high pressure, stressful situations, lack of sleep, and anxiety.

What some people may not realise is it’s also been a struggle as we’ve had less face to face contact, more virtual meeting and telephone calls. It’s harder to read people when you’re not facing them, and if you take too long to collect your thoughts on a phone call, the other person may think you’ve hung up!

Having a stammer can be exhausting if you let it overcome you – I live with it and don’t let it control me. I think it’s good to raise awareness and be open about it as I’m sure I’m not alone. We all have our weaknesses and I think the pandemic has taught us more than ever to be kind to each other.

While at our Trust I’ve benefited from the support of our Speech and Language Therapy team and I’m delighted that they’ve offered to run a virtual drop-in session for any staff who would like support or advice for a stammer, or any related issue.”