Personal Experience: Ashwagandha + L-Theanine Helped Me Become Fluent!!!

NOT AN ADVICE. This is my personal experience

I’ve been a stutterer all my life. Maybe since I was 4-5 years old. I am now in my mid-30s.

Like all of you, I had my ups and downs. I’d learned to be at peace. I avoid public speaking and I’m okay on social settings (learned to be). I have a baseline fluency when I try to, but it all goes away when I’m stressed or very nervous.

Recently, about 6-7 months ago, I started taking Ashwagandha and L-Theanine. Both are natural supplements. L-Theanine is extracted from black tea and Ashwagandha is a herb itself.

I didn’t take them for stammer. I took them for nootropic purposes. Basically for focus, reducing my stress/anxiety, and neuron regeneration and whatnot.

Somehow, I found that it led to pretty good verbal fluency in social settings and business settings. I was able to lead meetings (I usually don’t, even though I am actually a C-level), verbally articulate all my thoughts almost as well as in writing, and bantered with my clients to the point of surprise for everyone in my team (they all know why I don’t talk much in meetings).

I think it is because Ashwagandha and L-Theanine both have the effect of reducing anxiety a lot, keeping you calm. On top of focus and other effects. That pretty much dulls my social anxiety to the point of not surfacing at all, and I think since anxiety has been one of the huge contributing factor to my stutter, it is due to that.

Added bonus is that since I now have many repeat encounters with people where they don’t even know I stutter (until I tell them), it boosts my confidence and I noticed that now, even on days when I am not taking Ashwagandha + L-Theanine, I would be able to speak fluently (maybe about 70% fluency compared to when I take them). My anxiety is also generally lower overall.

There are still a lot of situations where it does not help at all though. When my imposter syndrome surfaces around some very high-profile people, then no amount of anxiety-reducing supplements or herbs can help. Just recently I spoke at a roundtable discussion (yes, now I can speak publicly too, although I loathe to do it) on a Twitter Space, and there were some very high profile people in the panel with me. That day, my fluency dropped to maybe 50% cos I was anxious as hell to even open my mouth around those folks.

Again, this is not an advice. I am just sharing my experience. I know the pain and suffering we all go through. Just want to share a slice of respite I found recently.