Allied Health Graduate Combats Stuttering, Plans to Help Others
This past winter, Damian Wilson faced a crucial moment in one of his classes at UCs College of Allied Health Sciences. In a room with students he didnt really know, who didnt know him, he had to give a presentation to the class.
"I stuttered through my whole speech, he remembers. "Usually Im so scared that I dont even say everything I want to say. But when I started stuttering, I felt so calmI felt like I was OK with it. After it was over, I was as happy as I could be. Because I had faced a fear of mine and I had done it.
The senior communications sciences and disorders major remembers stuttering since he was 5 years old. But it took many years before he would feel comfortable speaking to anyone outside his immediate family.
It took longer than that before he realized that he wanted to use his experience as a gift, to become a speech language pathologist and work with children who are facing the same challenges that hes facedand overcome.
Growing up, Wilson says he was "lost.
"Every school year was the same thing. I would be at a school for a year and I would want to leave, he says. "I didnt want the kids to know I stuttered and I didnt want to be teased.
So he stayed in the background, only opening up to his family members, some of whom also stuttered. Lacking confidence and hating school, he brought home report cards with near-failing grades.
"I think people looked at me like I was stupid, he says. "But when youre not confident in yourself and you hate school ... I never was an A or B student. I dont think my parents understood why I was getting those grades.
He enrolled in college after graduating high school, but lasted nine months before dropping out.
"I wasnt ready, he says. "My classroom speeches were horribleit was like I was reliving high school. I couldnt handle it, so I left. It took me years to have enough confidence to be in school all over again.
He spent those years working, bagging groceries and unloading packages, working as a lab tech and dietary aide and finally an audio engineer for television news. But then he saw a pattern to his career: He consistently chose jobs that didnt require him to speak or where he could minimize talking to co-workers.
Not wanting to stay in the background for the rest of his career, Wilson went back to school, enrolling in UC in 2007 at 27 years old. Shortly after, he met Associate Clinical Professor Carney Sotto, PhD, undergraduate program director for the college.
"When I met Damian, he was so motivated, a really focused young man, says Sotto. "I was impressed that he wanted to be a speech pathologist. Hes even a different person now than when I met him three years agohes more assertive, he takes more initiative.
Associate Professor Jo-Anne Prendeville, EdD, says Wilsons not a student to stay quiet if he has questions about his work.
"Damian will make a point to come and talk to you, she says. "Hes very specific. Hes knows what he wants to ask and hell turn that around and use it to be successful. Hes got such a positive attitude and hes just such an enjoyable person.
To recognize his achievements, the college has selected Wilson as its flag-bearer for the 2012 Commencement ceremony.
Wilson says he is "honored by the selectionand is looking forward to returning to French East in the fall, when he will start the masters program in Speech-Language Pathology.
But hes not content to wait before jumping into the speech-language pathology community. He serves as vice president and webmaster of student group Multi-Cultural Concerns in Communication Sciences and Disorders. He also volunteers for Fluency Friday, a day-and-a-half intensive program designed to help students of all ages learn about fluency and meet others who stutter.
Outside UC, Wilson works with both the adult and youth sections of Cincinnatis chapters of the National Stuttering Association.
Hes also started volunteering with UC alumna Lisa Froehlich, PhD, an SLP at Cincinnatis Taft High School, serving as an assistant in her speech therapy sessions. He wants to return to a similar urban school to work once he becomes an SLP.
"All of the speech therapists Ive had in my life, all of them wanted to help me, he says. "All of us want support in life and all of us want to be appreciated in lifeand all of my SLPs appreciated me.
Its just recently that Wilson started to appreciate his own history with stuttering. While attending a meeting of the National Stuttering Association, he said he had an "epiphany when learning about covert stuttering, a term used to describe stutterers who avoid certain words or situations that could lead to them stuttering.
"I understood that was me, he says. "All those years, I was hiding. I put a wall up and told people that they didnt understand me. But if I dont open up, or if I dont speak, how will other people ever know me? So I finally understood thatand I want to help others who stutter understand that as well.
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