Like most people, I am a maze of contradictions. On the one hand, I have spent most of my adult life coming to accept and live with the fact of my stutter. I have learned to regard myself as a generally upbeat person living a useful and productive life, but sometimes, especially on bad speaking days, my disability overwhelms me. Then my inability to communicate effectively gets the best of me, and against my true nature, I retreat into myself. Unlike a sick cat, I cannot crawl under a bed or hide behind the sofa.
Some pills work, after all.
Every autumn I take my daily dose of hay fever pills and, miraculously, I'm rid of the sneezing, wheezing, drippy nose, and teary eyes that I used to suffer in that season. When I heard about the NIH program, I immediately volunteered. The drug that the NIH was testing is a powerful tricyclic antidepressant called Clomiphamine. Clomiphamine affects the action of serotonin, a neurotransmitter that helps brain cells communicate with each other. The actual workings of serotonin and other neurotransmitters are still being studied.