Expert: Erin E. Maio-Harrison, MA,CCC-SLP - 12/8/2004

Question
People say that I tend to mumble and sometimes it is hard to understand what I am saying. Their is also some words that are hard for me to pronounce. They all have the letter "r" in them. I am now 16 and I have been like this for as long as I can remember. No one says anything about it, but I know that it sounds really bad. I took speech classes when I was younger but obviously they didn't help. I really hate speaking to a group of people because I know that it sounds bad. A lot of times I will try not to say anything that invloves the letter "r", but that's almost impossible to do. Is their anything I can do to stop it, any information would be very helpful. Thanks. Brian

Answer
Hello Brian-  well, you are right in that you can't run away from the /r/ sound.  It sounds like this is just a stubborn speech error left over from your younger days.  While the /r/ can be a difficult sound to teach and learn, it is NOT impossible and at your age and with your motivation I think you make a great candidate for therapy.

That means of course I think you need to resume speech therapy.  This is not something you can correct on your own (or you would have done it by now).  You can start by asking the speech pathologist at your school if you go to public school.  If not, then talk to your parents about this.  Therapy may be available free thru the public schools but it depends on if you qualify and I can't tell you that.  School therapists are usually the best at the /r/ sound because it is so common.  Private therapy is an option but expensive.  You might also talk to a speech pathologist who works with adult speakers of English as a Second Language as that is a sound that needs to be taught to many of those adults.   

Good Luck Brian and let me know if you need any more assistance-

Erin E. Harrison, MA,CCC-SLP
Speech/Language Pathologist