Stammering, Its Cause and Cure

time I did not have what I desired to eat because I was afraid to ask for it. When I did ask, every eye was turned on me, and the looks of the strangers,

I was about to ask for more when I bethought myself. "Please pass-" I could never do it-"p" was one of the hard sounds for me. "Please pass-" No, I couldn't do it. So busying myself with the things that were near at hand and helping myself to those things which came my way, I made out the meal-but I got up from the table hungry and with a d

ble in the same light as myself-as an affliction much to be regretted. At home I was not required to do anything which would embarrass me or cause me to b

me comes to all boys. It was soon to be MY task to face the world-to make a living for myself. And this was a thing which, strangely enough for a boy of my age, I began to think about. I h

trouble. He gave me a cursory examination and decided that my stuttering was caused by nervousness, and gave me some very distasteful medicine, which I was compelled to take three times a day. This medicine did me no good. I took it for five years, but there was no progress made toward curing my stuttering. The r

known ability, he had not made a study of speech disorders and knew practically nothing about either the cause or cure of stammering or stuttering. Even t

taken with the pamphlet that he would furnish, both for the sum of one dollar, would cure stammering. I didn't have the dollar, so I did not buy. But the next day I went back, and I took the dollar along. He got my dollar, and I still have the book. Of course, I received no benefit whatever. I later came to the conclusion

they were costly, for they taught me a badly-needed lesson, t

with my parents, said that I would outgrow the trouble. "All that is necessary," re

r cannot forget his difficulty-who can say that he would be cured if he did? You might as well say to a man holding a hot poker,

vest mistakes we ever made. Had I followed the advice of others who believed in the outgrowing theo

ause he is giving him a false hope-in fact the most futile hope that any stammerer ever had. I wish I could paint in the sky, in letters of fire, the truth that "Stammering cannot be outgrown," because this, of all things, is the most freque

nts made me strain every nerve to stop my imperfect utterance, but all to no avail. At this time I knew nothing of the underlying principles

rs needs no inducement to cause him to desire to be cured, because the change from his condition as a stammerer to that of a nonstammerer is of mo

off the affliction. I did everything in my power, worked almost da

act that there were times when my impediment seemed almost to disappear, but to our surprise and disappointment, it

discovered that a partial relief from the difficulty was one of the true symptoms of the malady. And I learned furthe