This morning presented the third session for speach therapy, I found it quite a learning expereince. On recording and playback, I found it striking to hear myself and my inability to pronounce certain words. Today we concentrated on th, as in thick and thin. I am unable to say such, and seem to pronounce a ch instead, and when saying a sentence there is obviously a communication problem as people will pick on certain of my words and say hang on, whats he say, and before we know it the subject in discussion is lost in a cloud of uncertainity. The options.

Adopt and Irish accent, why not I love Guinness, and say tick and tin, tow two speak. Sounds a lot better to me on playback.

Adopt a London accent, as in fer guvnor, not so sure, or even a German accent where the becomes ze.

I would like to know if anyone similar has encountered this subject. It matters as I want to return to teaching scuba diving, but of course I am so self concious of my mis communication. And to be honest the more I seem to work at it the worse it becomes, but the converse is true I believe. A bit like learning to swing a wood properly, but it doesn't feel quite right yet, almost weird.

Later in the morning I received some masssage of face and neck. I dunno about others but five months after R/T and my cheeks and neck are still quite swollen. The massage helped a lot, I will be trying more of this therapy. And some tongue exercises. I had to push against someone elses finger, quite different, but muscle definitely there. I experienced a cold teaspoon being stroked down the tongue, make it more grooved, try and flexibilise it up a bit, as its pretty static.

An interesting morning, its obvious to me then that you have to ask as much as you can in todays society.

So overall we are on track, but its slow. Food intake increasing quite nicely, but I realize the days of eating pizza are gone. My teeth, well whats left of the lovely set I used to pride, before removal for R/T, are ok, they ached last week, but more flouride and brushing seems to have helped, min 3 daily.

I arranged physio of my neck yesterday, only to learn after remaining left in the waiting room that I was in the wrong place, its moved buildings but the signs hadn't. So I went to the correct buiding an hour late and it was closed. Then a letter arrived this morning saying as I had failed to turn up I was now discharged.

Funny old world how everybody seems so clever at judging others.

All the best, globally, this is a journey and not such an easy one, and I read some of you are in quite some distress of late. I am thinking about you though.

Nigel

Hey Nigel ,sorry i am laughing at your post but everyone gets days like these especially in hospitals .Paul had the speach therapy and was not impressed as he felt as if he was in kindergarten, but wih a little nagging and making him do his pronounciations and rhymes etc 3 times a day !!!!!( take note ) it DOES work .Also helps loosen the tight stiff muscles in the face etc .Pauls mouth was like a frozen thin line for a while and moving his lips to pronounce certain letters was nigh impossible .This did work, but you do need to practice .The massage also works but again you need to try and do this at least twice a day .I did this for Paul as Physios taught me how to .Do you have anyone who could help you with this at home as it is difficult to do whole routine yourself especially at back of neck .

Paul's speech is great now back to normal as long as he uses his mouth spray, as if mouth too dry he is muffled .

You will get there Nigel just persevere .

Best wishes Bell and Paul.

Thanks a lot Paul and Bell for the reassurances.

I will see if I can get some assistance for massage locally.

Take care

Hi Nigel
Everything sounds very positive for you and I'm really happy for you too. Your exercises and massage sound a bit like piano practice ~ you've got to stick at it to get the results. Good luck, you'll be fine in no time, I'm sure.
I had an issue with my naturopath just last week over 'failing to keep your last appt' (which I had told her I wouldn't be there for). I bet you didn't burst into tears like a great big wuss like I did. That'll teach 'em! I guess that was the day I didn't need to be messed with! You've got to laugh, don't you? A friend had a consultation a couple of days later and my name came up and the naturopath asked how things were (for me) and my friend said a bit tough, or words to that effect and the nat. said 'yes, I think she is very stressed'. Well guess what? I had manageable stress til she tipped me over the edge!!!!
We all live to face another day. Make it a good one, Nigel.
Take care
Deborah

Too right Deborah, I hope she felt like crawling in a hole. Nige, you have done so, so well. I think that you notice on hearing your voice more than anyone else would. Your charm makes any impediment attractive. Aldo I do tink a touch of the blarney helps!

Hi Nigel

The hardest thing for me to say since I got Flappy has been "chitty chitty bang bang". I still have a very slight lisp if I'm over tired, but many of my relatives lisp naturally, so no big deal. It's still early days, though. Believe me, your speech will improve over time.

I didn't know how I would sound after my month-long speech holiday, so I was understandably self-conscious. What helped me was my cat, Mr. Pib (a handsome gray cat with a white mark right about where I now have my trach scar). I could talk to him without worrying about how I sounded.


Sorry to hear about the mess up on your appointment. It was their responsibility to let you know they'd moved. Why not send them a bill for the time you wasted because of their error?

Julia

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