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| Best Original Screenplay "The King's Speech" |
David Seidler, writer of the King’s Speech, accepted his Oscar on behalf of stutterers throughout the world and proclaimed that we have a voice and we have been heard. I know he certainly found his voice in a major way. What he also did was inspire me to rediscover my voice and allow myself to be heard. I feel that if he could confront his stuttering by telling the story of the man who inspired him as child and be bold enough to make an acceptance speech seen by the millions of people, I can take a small step to confront my stuttering. The first thing I want people to understand is the impact a stutter can have on someone’s life. Mr. Seidler made a point of asserting stutters have found a voice because that’s the most precious thing it can rob you of. The worst part is that stutters can become so accustomed to silencing themselves that they might not fully comprehend the full extent of what they have really lost. Stuttering has the ability to change a person’s life and identity. Think about how much someone’s personality is based on how they communicate and interact with others. Now factor in a condition that completely changes how a person communicates. What you now have is a circumstance that could completely change how someone deals with the world and people around them. If a person is verbally open, unafraid to speak their mind and engage with people, they are considered confident and outgoing. A person who holds their head down and is reluctant to raise their voice is considered timid and introverted. The impact that stuttering can have on someone’s personality can in turn have ramifications that touches every aspect of life including career choices, decisions to take risks, social life, relationships, and the very goals that a person sets for themselves. My point is that having a stutter is much more than a mere annoyance; it is a life changing condition. It instills so much fear, self-doubt, and anxiety in a person that it feels as if you’re being suffocated by your own voice sometimes. If you have seen the King’s Speech you might have noticed that he approached an audience like a firing squad and a microphone as if it were a noose; that’s a very accurate representation of how a stutterer feels when forced to expose their voice.
Communication is one of those essentials of life that we greatly take for granted until something happens to inhibit our ability to use it. Having to fight to use your voice everyday can get tiring and discouraging at times, but I don’t say this to solicit any pity because that is the last thing a stutterer wants. I say it to give some insight into what it means to struggle with something that most people do effortlessly and clearing up some long-standing misconceptions is the first step. Stuttering is not something that can be turned off like a light switch and even with intense speech therapy; it can still be a lifelong struggle to manage it. Due to how little is known regarding the causes of stuttering, people tend take liberty to become experts and give simple suggestions to cure a complex condition. Simply taking a breath before you speak, relaxing a little more or just spitting it out isn’t a cure for stuttering and no matter how much I wish it were, I don’t think it ever will be. Even though it may be well intended, it’s rather insulting to the hard work and struggle a stutterer puts into managing their speech by implying that one simple action could have been the cure all along. It also hints at the idea that a stutterer can stop at any time by putting a few simple actions into practice and that’s also incredibly false. Like it or not most stutterers are burdened with this for the rest of our lives and the only thing we can do is to manage it to best of our ability and in the process of that retain the confidence to use our voices as we deem necessary.
I’m 30 years old and it wasn’t until a few years ago that I realized how much of my voice and self-expression I had lost because of my impediment. I was told that by choosing to silence my voice to avoid the embarrassment of my stutter, I had also unknowingly suppressed other things in myself. I can vaguely remember when I decided the best way to handle my stuttering was to just shut up and hope that I wouldn’t have to speak at all. However, in this world, communication is not an option and that was a terrible choice, but as a kid, it was the best decision I could make at the time. Now after 20 years of locking away my voice and everything else of value I have to offer, I think it’s time to try something a different. I see now that I have given this thing more power over my life than it ever should have had by being afraid to confront it openly and honestly. I compare it to an old wound that is kept covered with a band-aid. It may stay protected to certain extent and kept hidden as much as possible. However, you still feel the pain of that wound and it is never allowed to heal because it can’t breathe. I have kept my stutter and all the issues surrounding it so guarded for all these years that I allowed it to fester and infect so many areas of my life. And even up until less than a year ago I couldn’t be approached about it without getting upset. But no more of that! It’s time to rip the bandage off expose the wounds and let them heal. There is nothing I can do about the havoc I allowed my stuttering to wreak on my life so far, but I can take my power back now and reclaim my voice. I hope I can even speak for others who aren’t yet ready to raise their voices. In an interview David Seidler talked about his attitude towards his stuttering and how it allowed his overcome it at a young age. His attitude was “If I have to stutter for the rest of my life then people are gonna bloody well have to listen to me!” I think I will try that for a while and see how it suits me.
