My 2023 Stuttering Journey

Good morning everyone,

I hope you’re having a great start to the week 🙂

2023 ended three weeks ago, bringing with it the start of a whole new year, filled with possibilities, opportunities and experiences galore. While thinking ahead to 2024, I like to take a bit of time to do a bit of reflection, thinking back on everything that happened in 2023, how it impacted me, and how I can use it moving forward into the future.

With that in mind, today’s blog is going to reflect on my stuttering journey throughout 2023 – let’s get cracking!

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2023 was one of the most difficult years of my life, and it is only natural that going through everything that I did impacted my speech in some shape or form. In saying that, I am incredibly proud of how resilient I have been during it all, and the growth that I’ve faced in the last year alone is, in my opinion, absolutely staggering.

What exactly happened along my journey to speech fluency, well then, let’s take a look!

January – March 2023

On the 15th January 2023, my beloved grandmother, Rosemary Elizabeth Hopkin, passed away after over nine years of battling Alzheimer’s. Nana was the person that I was closest to in the world, which made coming to terms with her no longer being with us to be a very challenging process. At first, I didn’t deal with her loss very well, with my emotions going all over the place, which caused my control over my stutter to go slightly awry.

I began to get my speech fluency back under control throughout February and heading into March before things took another unexpected twist. On the 31st of March, my cherished grandfather, David John Royston Hopkin, sadly left us, joining Nana back up in the sky. Losing both Nana and Cap in such quick succession was devastating, hitting my family incredibly hard.

Upon losing Cap, I made a promise to myself. I promised that no matter what happened, I would always do as much as I could to keep my speech under control. Nana and Cap wouldn’t have wanted me to throw away all of the progress that I made – they would have wanted me to use all of the kindness and lessons that they taught me throughout my life to continue motivating myself to improve, which is something that I did my very best to do heading into the second quarter of the year.

April – June 2023

The next three months were filled with a lot of reflection, introspection and thought-provoking journeys. I wanted to take the time to properly understand what I was feeling, giving myself the best environment to process things in a way that worked for me. Looking back, I feel like I did a truly wonderful job of managing it all. While my speech was a little shaky at times, I managed to regain control, and as the days went on, I began to build my confidence and belief back up again.

I’ve come to the realisation a lot recently that it’s not the cards that you are dealt in life that matter at the end of the day, what matters is how you use them. We never know for sure what the future has in store, and while that can seem like a bit of a daunting prospect, there is an unlimited number of possibilities out there for each and every one of us. I won’t lie and say that the journey was easy, because it certainly wasn’t, but looking back, I learnt such a lot along the way. If one thing is for sure, it’s that my ability to bounce back with my speech fluency is so much stronger now, compared to what it was a few years back.

July – September 2023

July through to September were, on the whole, absolutely amazing months. I went off to London to catch up with some of my friends, I went on my family holiday to Cyprus and life was really starting to look up. I did find at times that I was rushing my talking a little, which would result in the occasional stammer, however, as long as I gave myself enough time to think everything through, that wasn’t an issue at all.

Reflecting back, I think that what really helped in these months was the sheer volume of people that I spoke to. Whether it was virtual calls at work, attending in-person networking events such as TwentiesFest and Social Media Conference Cymru, or even just the usual conversations that I was having with friends and family, it all started to add up. There were cases where I barely stuttered whatsoever when speaking, a testament to the hard work that I had put in over the year.

October – December 2023

The final quarter of 2023 looked as if they were going to go excellently, when unfortunately, towards the end of November, my grandfather, James Edward Sweeney, was taken into hospital. On the 22nd of November 2023, he sadly passed away, joining my Nana and Cap up in the stars. Life never prepares you for the loss of a grandparent, let alone three in the same year, so I am sure that you can believe, it hit me and my family very hard.

Grampa was the dictionary definition of a character – he had more stories than I could ever count, always had a smile on his face and he was loved by everybody who had the pleasure of meeting him. One of the key lessons that Grampa taught me subconsciously is how life is full of surprises, and that there is something magical about tackling each day with a smile on your face and a can-do attitude.

Even though it was heartbreaking to lose him, something which did weaken the control that I had over my talking, I got back up again and started rebuilding my self-confidence. Heading into 2024, I’m going to keep all of the lessons and advice that Nana, Cap and Grampa taught me over the years – while they are no longer with us physically, their legacies will live on eternally ❤

Closing Thoughts

2023 was a very unpredictable year, one that I will never want to experience again, however, in saying that, I am very impressed with how I managed to balance everything. My stutter went on one crazy journey over the last 12 months, but I feel like I have learnt a lot and come a long way through it, which is the most important thing. I feel confident that I have a much better understanding of my speech now, and that I can bounce back from things much quicker.

Looking ahead to 2o24, I haven’t got a clue what’s in store, but I am completely okay with that. While I can’t predict the future, I can go into it with the best mindset possible, which I am sure will help me out massively.

That’s all for today’s blog, what do you think? Have you enjoyed following along with my journey to speech fluency throughout 2023? What’s the biggest lesson that you learnt last year?

I’d love to hear your thoughts!

Thanks for reading and I hope you have a lovely day!