Yah! Victory. The hardest blocks I get as a person who stutters, are when I'm talking on the phone. Training as a police reservist, it was inevitable that the day would come when I would need to talk on the radio ... so I was dreading the thought of having to use the radio. In particular you have to use certain words on the radio - no way around it. For example 'P' is Papa. P's are tricky because they are stop plosive sounds where the air coming out of your chest is temporarily stopped, so blocks are more likely.
Today, being a public holiday for elections we went out for a special duty at 5:30am. I was paired up with a Sergeant in the vehicle, really great person to work with. He was the driver and I was the 'crew' whose responsibility it is to operate the radio. He let me know that I would be using the radio. I was quite honest with him and said that I am keen to give it a shot, however I sometimes stutter badly on certain words and he may need to jump in. He was OK with this and encouraged me to give it a go.
When starting a shift you need to book on (this is code 01) with 'control' (the head office/controller) for all the units out. You need to let control know the vehicle you are in, crew and driver details, contact numbers, area etc. I wrote down exactly what I needed to say, took a deep breath, squeezed the button on the radio and started to speak!
Control this is Papa Victor 29, 01 please
And it went really, really well! I stuttered a bit on some of the words but was able to say everything I needed to say! Control understood and the Sergeant encouraged me afterwards! Had to speak a few more times on the radio during the day and they all went well.
