A look at the mechanics of stuttering

[YChang 3441]

The video has a really interesting way to demonstrate what a stutterer goes through. Overall a really insightful series of people living with disabilities. 

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/08/23/opinion/stutter-speech-listening.html?unlocked_article_code=AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAACEIPuomT1JKd6J17Vw1cRCfTTMQmqxCdw_PIxftm3iWka3DFDmwZiOMNAo6B_EGKfrZ-e8c-xXGAXNJMO79qQP1p0uJZPkpiDQm0p5_O0LI0HxIIk6PhFGUnw8CKGrki7T7hamT-de4imOKx7hnDPjPqXLjY0nR3OAYzoZZ6Jl2v3XEClPiUQe5wycA-ial6fu1yRjYGYSaIvfj6WV4paJjdMEaqukRhUPpZWDrTgdeW97kBFQ5RAl7AR3h_in0uvJIeYJhEefaicGNzPZb2kr4TCWd3LYe2BJZXRIDck7hisrWlugXHuX1J70GoSsdr97XrLfar&smid=url-share

[Kennythetiger 9374]

[Sbbruin 21826]

[PRONG HORN 3130]

Do stutterers give good blowjobs?  I wouldn't know.  

[Kennythetiger 9374]

You never asked him after he finished?  

[Not that Bob 735]

Purely anecdotal but when I worked, for several years, evaluating the medical records of children with disabilities I found it striking the number of children, especially boys whose problems began with a speech impairment. The progression was: speech impairment>being teased and taunted by their peers>refusal to attend school because of this peer rejection>deteriorating grades>behavior problems. Since that time I have noticed some of the mass shooters have/had speech impairments, the most recent being the Uvalde shooter. 

[Brisketexan 105043]

Mel Tillis is not amused by your shenanigans.

He's actually quite interested, and touched that researchers care.

1 minute ago, Not that Bob said:

Purely anecdotal but when I worked, for several years, evaluating the medical records of children with disabilities I found it striking the number of children, especially boys whose problems began with a speech impairment. The progression was: speech impairment>being teased and taunted by their peers>refusal to attend school because of this peer rejection>deteriorating grades>behavior problems. Since that time I have noticed some of the mass shooters have/had speech impairments, the most recent being the Uvalde shooter. 

Goddamn, that's interesting, and it's a correlation that sadly makes sense.  I wonder if there's been any research along those lines?

[RPM 26315]

I had a boss when I was trucking that had a really bad stutter. He was the nicest, most generous man you ever want to meet. I had to try extremely hard not to finish his words for him because I knew how rude it was. But damn it was hard not to.

[YGIFS 19449]

30 minutes ago, Not that Bob said:

Purely anecdotal but when I worked, for several years, evaluating the medical records of children with disabilities I found it striking the number of children, especially boys whose problems began with a speech impairment. The progression was: speech impairment>being teased and taunted by their peers>refusal to attend school because of this peer rejection>deteriorating grades>behavior problems. Since that time I have noticed some of the mass shooters have/had speech impairments, the most recent being the Uvalde shooter. 

Yeah, not to tout my wife's service as a Speech-Language Pathologist...but your experience is so true and so truly heartbreaking.  Half of her kids end up in a referral loop where they come to her because some other behavioral therapist or PT or counselor or teacher said maybe the speech thing is an underlying cause of XYZ or she makes a referral of "Timmy/Sally is doing better at speech but there are signs of XYZ in other parts of their development." 

Think about how frustrating and maddening it must be for a 4 or 5 year old whose peers are truly able to communicate their needs and wants and dislikes for the first time to adults, and you're only one who can't.  It can lead to so many other issues in the near and long term.  Academics, athletics, social skills, being cool, that's all important for kids.  But if you can't communicate effectively as a kid, you're fucked.  

She's used to this now but what used to drive her up the fucking wall for years (besides me) was parents who saw speech therapy as this thing they should be doing outside of school (the kids in public schools only get 10-15 mts from a grad student and that's if their lucky).  So they'd start coming in after school/summers, or in the case of littles---before or after preK.  And the parents would be really dedicated at first, and do the exercises at home.  And after a couple months, it was this constant stream of excuses "Well, we can't make it in this week...he's got basketball camp" or "She's in dance class now, so we'll just do the exercises you gave as at home and check in with you next year."  In this rush to have a "well-rounded/cool" kid, the parents just fucked the child over for years by pulling them outta speech.  They come crawling back 18 months later, sobbing about their kid being taunted at school or falling behind in reading or acting out and hitting at home.  And she had to undo all that bullshit from a lost year.  

Best proof you need to stay on top of your child's speech---your insurance company is dying to pay for it.  They cover 100% of the cost and there isn't an insurer on the planet that won't approve my wife's practice.  She gets paid, in full, every 30 days.  Because insurance knows if a parent has a slight financial excuse not to do speech, odds are heavy that way more serious and expensive shit is right around the corner.   /rant&god bless SLP's

[Not that Bob 735]

Your comment on insurance is interesting because in the recent past insurance would not pay for, or only pay a portion of the costs of speech therapy. It's good news that that has changed. 

[mchookem 16318]

good read/watch, thanks for sharing

obligatory

 

Edited August 24, 2022 by mchookem

[YGIFS 19449]

not that  bob---The shift, at least for all the private practice folks she knows in Austin, started about ~3 years ago.  The "trend" seemed to be at the time about 70% insurance, 30% private pay.  With many of those insured getting anywhere from 50-80% of it covered.  At least for her network (which is in the dozens, if not 100 around Texas)...it seems to now be 90%+ insurance, 10% private pay so you don't have to hound the parent for money.  And of the insured, it's 80-100% covered for almost all plans (obviously there's still shitty insurance plans out there no matter what).  She used to spend probably an hour a day on the phone/online dealing with insurance companies.  She now spends maybe an hour a month catching on insurance bullshit.  YMMV.  

Edited August 24, 2022 by YGIFS

[Gatorubet 30183]

17 hours ago, Sbbruin said:

[956 Worldwide 34695]

1 hour ago, Not that Bob said:

Purely anecdotal but when I worked, for several years, evaluating the medical records of children with disabilities I found it striking the number of children, especially boys whose problems began with a speech impairment. The progression was: speech impairment>being teased and taunted by their peers>refusal to attend school because of this peer rejection>deteriorating grades>behavior problems. Since that time I have noticed some of the mass shooters have/had speech impairments, the most recent being the Uvalde shooter. 

I was born tongue-tied and for some reason never explained to me, did not have it snipped before learning to talk. I couldn’t say the “r” sound correctly which was fine as a toddler but started to be a problem in school.  I very clearly remember the counter guy at pizza slice place laughing at me for ordering “peppewoni” and also a friend’s dad asking me “will you ever grow out of baby-talk” at a birthday party.  I HATED speaking to people for years, even after I got the tongue tie snipped at about 8 years old and speech therapy. The therapy was a god-send.

[Gatorubet 30183]

17 minutes ago, 956 Worldwide said:

I was born tongue-tied and for some reason never explained to me, did not have it snipped before learning to talk. I couldn’t say the “r” sound correctly which was fine as a toddler but started to be a problem in school.  I very clearly remember the counter guy at pizza slice place laughing at me for ordering “peppewoni” and also a friend’s dad asking me “will you ever grow out of baby-talk” at a birthday party.  I HATED speaking to people for years, even after I got the tongue tie snipped at about 8 years old and speech therapy. The therapy was a god-send.

Seriously, congrats on the therapy, and sorry you had that experience. 

Yeah - you never heard this as a kid..,

[Jerry Callo 8694]

I had no idea that tongue-tied was an actual medical condition.

[YGIFS 19449]

25 minutes ago, Jerry Callo said:

I had no idea that tongue-tied was an actual medical condition.

That's rich coming from Joe Pesci.  You never understood the struggles of Spider.  And you fucking shot him for it.  

[Pancho 44685]

In teaching public speaking at the college level, I had to stop the lecture nearly every time we talked about speech anxiety because the majority of students would say they were afraid of “stuttering” in front of the class and my reply was usually something like this:

 

Stuttering is a speech disorder.  You’re talking about vocal flubs, which is just tripping over your words because you’re going to fast or you’re scared.  There’s a massive difference.  I can fix your vocal clubs in the time frame of this class.  Those with the condition of stuttering need a speech pathologist, and that isn’t me. 

[YGIFS 19449]

7 minutes ago, Pancho said:

In teaching public speaking at the college level, I had to stop the lecture nearly every time we talked about speech anxiety because the majority of students would say they were afraid of “stuttering” in front of the class and my reply was usually something like this:

 

Stuttering is a speech disorder.  You’re talking about vocal flubs, which is just tripping over your words because you’re going to fast or you’re scared.  There’s a massive difference.  I can fix your vocal clubs in the time frame of this class.  Those with the condition of stuttering need a speech pathologist, and that isn’t me. 

Take me to the vocal clubs, clubs.  

To this day, I still get kind of a lockjaw stammer thing happening some mornings when I have to speak more than 10-15mts.  Happens at work, in volunteer settings, in class, etc.  And then I also get it at the end of the day.  My wife, the SLP, has been dumbfounded.  It's not so much a stutter, as my jaw shakes up and down really fast between words.  I speak rapidly to begin with but tend to over-annunciate as well.  I used to be in high demand recording textbooks for the blind & dyslexic because I read fast and pronounced with effect.  Most of the volunteers were old people who read about 7 words a minute which frustrates the fuck outta blind people, "I'm blind, not slow.  Hurry up, I got shit to do!"  

But yes, to your point.  When we get locked up in front of people, that's not stuttering.  And it's public speaking anxiety.  20 years of "public speaking" and I still get jammed up.  Sometimes, really, really bad depending on the time of day.  I try to tell young employees and students and mentees that for me, it's never gone away.  There's certainly coping mechanisms, delay tactics, and ways to physically incorporate it into your speech.  It kinda sucks though 'cause when it starts, it can last for one sentence or one hour.  And you just don't freakin' know.  Her colleagues tried to analyze it a few times and were just like, "I dunno, you sound authoritarian but also a bit drunk."  And I just accepted, "Yeah, that's pretty much my personality."  And the only other note is, "You put the listener at ease with humor and insight though, but then seem to tense up like you don't like people."  Like goddamn, SLP's get me more than my therapist!  

Anyway, parents really need to pay more attention to this.  Communicative challenges have so much more to do with learning disabilities, spectrum identification, developmental stunting, bullying, violence, self-esteem than all the traveling baseball/cheer squad bullshit combined.  

[Underdog 28544]

About a 1:30 in… 

 

[conVINCEd 21469]

I was/am a stutterer.  Pretty bad.  3+ years of speech therapy as a young child.  It still creeps up from time to time if I’m nervous, otherwise you would never know.  The upside to stuttering is that you develop a really good vocabulary at a young age, because you learn to pivot to a synonym if you can feel that the word you want to say isn’t going to happen.

[Kennythetiger 9374]

12 minutes ago, conVINCEd said:

I was/am a stutterer.  Pretty bad.  3+ years of speech therapy as a young child.  It still creeps up from time to time if I’m nervous, otherwise you would never know.  The upside to stuttering is that you develop a really good vocabulary at a young age, because you learn to pivot to a synonym if you can feel that the word you want to say isn’t going to happen.

That’s pretty cool. 

[SHOOTER12 8800]

On 8/24/2022 at 9:59 AM, YGIFS said:

Yeah, not to tout my wife's service as a Speech-Language Pathologist...but your experience is so true and so truly heartbreaking.  Half of her kids end up in a referral loop where they come to her because some other behavioral therapist or PT or counselor or teacher said maybe the speech thing is an underlying cause of XYZ or she makes a referral of "Timmy/Sally is doing better at speech but there are signs of XYZ in other parts of their development." 

Think about how frustrating and maddening it must be for a 4 or 5 year old whose peers are truly able to communicate their needs and wants and dislikes for the first time to adults, and you're only one who can't.  It can lead to so many other issues in the near and long term.  Academics, athletics, social skills, being cool, that's all important for kids.  But if you can't communicate effectively as a kid, you're fucked.  

She's used to this now but what used to drive her up the fucking wall for years (besides me) was parents who saw speech therapy as this thing they should be doing outside of school (the kids in public schools only get 10-15 mts from a grad student and that's if their lucky).  So they'd start coming in after school/summers, or in the case of littles---before or after preK.  And the parents would be really dedicated at first, and do the exercises at home.  And after a couple months, it was this constant stream of excuses "Well, we can't make it in this week...he's got basketball camp" or "She's in dance class now, so we'll just do the exercises you gave as at home and check in with you next year."  In this rush to have a "well-rounded/cool" kid, the parents just fucked the child over for years by pulling them outta speech.  They come crawling back 18 months later, sobbing about their kid being taunted at school or falling behind in reading or acting out and hitting at home.  And she had to undo all that bullshit from a lost year.  

Best proof you need to stay on top of your child's speech---your insurance company is dying to pay for it.  They cover 100% of the cost and there isn't an insurer on the planet that won't approve my wife's practice.  She gets paid, in full, every 30 days.  Because insurance knows if a parent has a slight financial excuse not to do speech, odds are heavy that way more serious and expensive shit is right around the corner.   /rant&god bless SLP's

Welcome to Surly...I too approve your wife's practice 😉

Srsly through, thank you for a great, insightful post. While I knew speech impediments were difficult,  I didn't realize how much so.  Thinking back to my school days,  I knew of 4 or 5 kids who had stuttering problems.  Looking back at how they wound up as adults? * Not good, not good at all.*

*please note that none of these folks EVER received any kind of aid or help with their disabilities.  Small town Texas schools in the 60s either didn't have the resources or flat didn't care. If I remember correctly all of their families struggled financially and those kids were teased, and ridiculed mercilessly.  We did have a  "speech class", but it wasn't a therapeutic thing, it was to teach public speaking. 

Edited August 25, 2022 by SHOOTER12

[ChuckNorrisActionJeans 2662]

So as a stutterer you could either become a school shooter or President of the United States.  

I kid. Salute all of you who had to overcome such a challenge. Makes me sad to think about the bullying or even just the lack of proper therapeutic attention. 

[ROFL BOX 6647]

-aent a PM to ROFL

Responded to.

[High Plains Drifter 11024]

On 8/24/2022 at 6:08 PM, conVINCEd said:

I was/am a stutterer.  Pretty bad.  3+ years of speech therapy as a young child.  It still creeps up from time to time if I’m nervous, otherwise you would never know.  The upside to stuttering is that you develop a really good vocabulary at a young age, because you learn to pivot to a synonym if you can feel that the word you want to say isn’t going to happen.

 

If you listen closely to Biden, you can hear/see him doing exactly this. Sounds like fairly short pauses at random places in his speech. 

 

 

 

[YGIFS 19449]

Yeah.  I think we’ve all noticed it.  There are speech delays that are cognitive and others that are physiological or “artic” As they say in their trade.  If I’ve been traveling or have not slept well, and have to present or even just do a business lunch or lecture, I get jammed up after aBout 45 mts.  It’s not so much a stutter but this kinda lockup.  My SLP thinks it’s because I won’t say anything for several hours and then have to speak for 60 minutes.  
 

Anyway, to all you parents with munchkins that have speech issues.  You’re actually fortunate.  There are so many more resources out there than when we came up.  Use them. 

[ClubWhatever 12120]

Gu

[Armybrat 40815]

My 53 year old son has developed a pronounced stutter in just the past year. 
He is aware of it, but doesn’t seem bothered.

His oldest son moved out of his house about two years ago, so I wonder if that has anything to do with it.

[orange dream 1246]

43 minutes ago, Armybrat said:

My 53 year old son has developed a pronounced stutter in just the past year. 
He is aware of it, but doesn’t seem bothered.

His oldest son moved out of his house about two years ago, so I wonder if that has anything to do with it.

Hopefully it's nothing, but I think I would get a Neuro and SLP evaluation if I was him.   Seems like there are a few causes of adult onset stuttering, some are no big deal, but some can be precursors to things that are better caught early.

I'm 53 so this hits close to home.

[Hate 20106]

My wife is also an SLP  (went to grad school and worked with @YGIFS wife). I’m going to show her this thread because Speech in the public schools is always overlooked. She gets her career satisfaction knowing that she has helped kids literally change their lives with her work. It’s heart warming to hear some Surlies have benefitted from speech therapy and know just what a difference it has made in their lives!

[YGIFS 19449]

Please don't show her this website, dude.  If you have...just print out a few relevant posts.  I thought we were keeping this on the down-low     i don't need our wives talking about all the other shit we've posting about over the years.  I probably have more to lose than you, but you won't exactly be in the clear either   

But yeah, anybody helping children from teachers to pediatricians to crossing guards to speech therapists...it's a higher calling and level of patience that is just beyond me.  Obviously we're biased towards Speech Therapists but I can objectively note that it's just as important as medical care for kids.  The late talkers, the articulation issues, etc.  If you can't effectively communicate you become frustrated.  You hurt yourself and you hurt others, physically.  We are hard-wired for oral/verbal communication.  It's one thing when you're isolated or just with family.  But when you can't effectively communicate but in our modern society of schools and sports and activities and the kids with speech issues can see other kids doing it well, it's even more crushing to them.  I've lived in denial about a great many things in my time on this rock.  But it is so saddening to see a parent not realize their child is having speech/communication issues and denies it's a problem.  The body can heal itself in remarkable ways.  But the psychological trauma from not being able to effectively communicate, that can last for decades.  /rant

To all the people out there who get up every morning to not only protect and provide services for children, but also have to deal with their parents.  God bless you.  I have a pretty big heart, but you are capable of love I will never know.  

[Stringer 1438]

 
If you listen closely to Biden, you can hear/see him doing exactly this. Sounds like fairly short pauses at random places in his speech. 
 
 
 

I have been a stutterer all my life. Not terrible, but it pops up, particularly if I am nervous or excited or it is a loud place. I did therapy for years and it is for sure better than when I was a kid. It definitely hurt my confidence growing up and stopped me from doing various things I would have done otherwise. I still don’t love meeting knew people or speaking to people on the phone (phone for some reason can be a trigger). Overall though I got through it and have somehow found myself leading a great life.

Sorry, just started talking and kept going. My point to the above is that I have mentioned this to many people who make comments about Biden’s flubs. As mentioned above, you have your find synonyms when you see a road block in front and you have to find a new route, even mid sentence. Not to brag on myself, but it’s a weird kind of super power. That said, to others it can make things sounds super disjointed. I don’t know if it sunk in long term for any of those people but at least for a moment, it gave them an alternative to “he’s just too old!”

[Wally Pryor 5261]

John turned his stutter into a multi-thousand dollar career. Plenty of gold here, starting with Ted Williams.

 

 

[YGIFS 19449]

IIRC, it was the "Go Carolina" story by David Sedaris.  My wife and I probably saw him a half-dozen times over the years do appearances and readings.  An he's hilarious, but in a very dry, erudite way like a Steven Wright and with the lingual cadence of a George Carlin.  But in that book/chapter or some other one, he tells this great tale of having a speech issue as a young man.  And he comes up with this whole nuanced vocabulary so as not to have to pronounce any of the syllables/letters that make him stutter/lisp.  And he pulls it off for a whole hour with the therapist.  And he crafted a whole language set in his head on the run, and thus began his brilliant and rich gift for craftsmanship of words.  Plus he also realized he was funny as hell and led a hilariously, adventurous life.  

But yeah, to repeat myself and above posts.  When you speak several hours a day in front of anything from a small team to a national broadcast, you're gonna fuck up.  That's just physiology.  I can go about 45 minutes before a slight stammer creeps in.  Again, almost like a lock-jaw deal.  It's not cognitive, my jaw just literally either freezes or shakes.  And I only have to speak at length a handful of times a week.  Humblebrag, but am bi-lingual and have an active vocabulary in both languages far in excess 99% of the population.  I have booked radio/voiceover gigs for decades.  But maybe it's middle age of sobriety, but I get locked up after awhile nowadays.  It's actually been getting better lately, but who the hell knows.  But if an 80-year old with a childhood stutter needs a second to relax their mouth, I think I can probably live with that.  But if your child or elderly parent is having any kind of issue, it's not a tacit admission of their being "dumb" or "slow" or "senile" or whatever.  Reach out to your local SLP.  The confidence boost of being able to communicate your needs and thoughts from age 2 to 102 is just as important as anything else in the human body.  

[Dutch 4465]

I stuttered quite severely as a child from birth. Years of speech therapy got it mostly under control, but it still reappears in some form almost every day. @YGIFS and @Hate, your wives and all SLPs are angels in disguise. Thank them from me and all those they have and will assist; their contributions matter to the kids and adults they treat matter far more than they will ever fathom.

On 8/24/2022 at 9:15 AM, Not that Bob said:

Purely anecdotal but when I worked, for several years, evaluating the medical records of children with disabilities I found it striking the number of children, especially boys whose problems began with a speech impairment. The progression was: speech impairment>being teased and taunted by their peers>refusal to attend school because of this peer rejection>deteriorating grades>behavior problems. Since that time I have noticed some of the mass shooters have/had speech impairments, the most recent being the Uvalde shooter. 

The darkness is real. Very real. I was blessed beyond measure to have the parents I have, but even then I had some very dark days as a teen. IMHO it helped me to grow up in the 1980s: the world stopped (and all the bullying that when along with it) at our doorstep, and I was able to mentally and emotionally regenerate (for lack of a better phrase) after school and at night. Technology has made it harder for kids today to leave the world outside. 

Edited May 23 by Dutch

[conVINCEd 21469]

On 5/22/2024 at 10:23 PM, High Plains Drifter said:

 

If you listen closely to Biden, you can hear/see him doing exactly this. Sounds like fairly short pauses at random places in his speech. 

 

 

 

As someone who has done this my entire life, he didn’t have to get elected potus for me to notice.

[YGIFS 19449]

On 5/23/2024 at 12:03 PM, Stringer said:

I have been a stutterer all my life. Not terrible, but it pops up, particularly if I am nervous or excited or it is a loud place. I did therapy for years and it is for sure better than when I was a kid. It definitely hurt my confidence growing up and stopped me from doing various things I would have done otherwise. I still don’t love meeting knew people or speaking to people on the phone (phone for some reason can be a trigger). Overall though I got through it and have somehow found myself leading a great life.

Sorry, just started talking and kept going. My point to the above is that I have mentioned this to many people who make comments about Biden’s flubs. As mentioned above, you have your find synonyms when you see a road block in front and you have to find a new route, even mid sentence. Not to brag on myself, but it’s a weird kind of super power. That said, to others it can make things sounds super disjointed. I don’t know if it sunk in long term for any of those people but at least for a moment, it gave them an alternative to “he’s just too old!”

Went back and reread your posts.  And holy shit, the phone thing.  As I posted above, I can get this lockup thing after about 45 mts.  But I play it off by hand gestures or writing something on the dry erase board or having water.  And it plays well because my appearance and tone just makes it look like I’m in charge.  But yeah, I get so jammed up on phone calls a few times per month.  And you can’t just shuffle papers or click slides on a phone call.  I’m a good listener but then when it’s my turn to talk over the phone, I can get mixed up.  There’s only so many times you can say you have to clear your throat.  
 

Have you looked into it at all?  I asked my wife and her explanation was that there isn’t still a set science between phones and speech.  But that it is odd that I can address hundreds of people in person but get jammed up with a single person on the other end of the line.  They think it has something to do with eye contact.  Apparently there’s a bunch of parallel studies of speech and Zoom calls during Covid.  Because we could see on another but it was this weird combo of we’re making eye contact but we’re not really making eye contact, we’re still just looking at a screen but I’m kinda looking your way.  
 

All kinds of shit to unpack 

[Brisketexan 105043]

Went back and reread your posts.  And holy shit, the phone thing.  As I posted above, I can get this lockup thing after about 45 mts.  But I play it off by hand gestures or writing something on the dry erase board or having water.  And it plays well because my appearance and tone just makes it look like I’m in charge.  But yeah, I get so jammed up on phone calls a few times per month.  And you can’t just shuffle papers or click slides on a phone call.  I’m a good listener but then when it’s my turn to talk over the phone, I can get mixed up.  There’s only so many times you can say you have to clear your throat.  
 
Have you looked into it at all?  I asked my wife and her explanation was that there isn’t still a set science between phones and speech.  But that it is odd that I can address hundreds of people in person but get jammed up with a single person on the other end of the line.  They think it has something to do with eye contact.  Apparently there’s a bunch of parallel studies of speech and Zoom calls during Covid.  Because we could see on another but it was this weird combo of we’re making eye contact but we’re not really making eye contact, we’re still just looking at a screen but I’m kinda looking your way.  
 
All kinds of shit to unpack 

I think l you get thrown off when the caller asks “so…what are you wearing?” right off the bat, but you know what? Get the fuck over it, you need to EARN that $5.99 a minute.

[YGIFS 19449]

So your side hustle is still that 1-900 gig for folks looking to chat with hot singles in their area?  Sickie.