The Princess’s Pea: A Tale of Sensitivity and Stuttering

Stuttering can feel like that small dried pea — overshadowing your entire identity and leaving you feeling black and blue — but it's only a small part of who you are.

In this episode, we take a fresh look at the timeless fairy tale "The Princess and the Pea" and reveal its surprising connection to stuttering. We explore the concept of sensitivity and its profound influence on those who stutter. This episode offers valuable strategies to navigate the intersection of sensitivity and stuttering, fostering awareness and self-discovery. Join us as we reinterpret the princess's restless night through the lens of stuttering, providing a thought-provoking perspective on this classic story.

Highlights

0:45 Introducing this favourite childhood story "The Princess and the Pea"
1:54 Original story read in it's entirety
6:56 Identify the 'special quality' that is the essence of this story
7:40 Research is shared about the connection between sensitivity and stuttering
9:30 How does the trait sensitivity influence the experience of stuttering?
10:55 Internalizing stuttering is like the small dried pea of the sensitive princess
13:40 Quick and fun test to learn what sensitivity traits describe you
14:25 Book recommendation to learn more about sensitivity
14:57 The importance of self-care in a loud and noisy world
15:33 Embracing your nature adds another dimension to your experiences

Links

What’s Your Stutter Personality? Take the quiz to find out! https://www.thehappystutterer.com/quiz/

Recovery from Stuttering Relapse: Coaching solutions with Paige
https://www.thehappystutterer.com/services/

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Transcript

Hi there. This is going to be a fun episode. Did you have a favorite storybook as a child? When I was young, even though I was scared of words when talking, I was not afraid of words when reading to myself. My all-time favourite book was a story called The Princess and the Pea. Do you remember this story?

The Princess and the Pea. was originally published in 1835 and written by the Danish storyteller Hans Christian Andersen. He's well known for writing many other famous children's stories like The Little Mermaid and The Ugly Duckling. To give you a hint as to what the story is about, it depicts how a princess proves her worthiness of being royal by feeling an uncooked pea under a pile of mattresses, as she tries to sleep.

I still have the actual little book. The spine is cracked and the cover is worn and weathered, but even though the book is old and beat up, it's one of my most treasured things from my childhood. To be honest, I didn't really understand the underlying message as a kid, but the vision of a princess sleeping atop a bed Almost as high as the ceiling caught the imagination of my younger self.

I'm going to read the story here in its entirety. Once upon a time there lived a prince who wanted to marry a princess, not, he said, just any princess, but a real princess. And so he traveled far and wide looking for a real princess. He met princesses known for their beauty, but they were not very wise.

And he met princesses admired for their wisdom, but they were not very beautiful. The prince knew he couldn't be happy with any of these. A real princess would be both wise and beautiful, he said. And sadly, he returned home to his father's kingdom. I have searched everywhere for a real princess without finding one, he said to the king and queen, and I will marry none other than a true princess.

One rainy night, not long after that, as lightning split the sky and thunder made the earth tremble, a knock was heard at the castle door. The servants will be too to open the door on a night like this, said the old king. And so, he chuckled, I think the king will just have to open it himself.

The great door squeaked and groaned as he tugged it open. When at last it yawned wide, there stood a lovely girl. Now, what would a slip of a lass like you be doing out in a storm like this? cried the king. I am Princess Roseanne, from the kingdom to the south, the maiden answered.

I lost my traveling companions during the storm. Oh, please, may I come in? A princess? Well, maybe, the king thinks. But mercy how she looked. Her cloak hung like a limp rag. Her dress was wet and dirty. Water ran in at the heels of her shoes and out again at the toes. And yet she declared that she was a real, a true princess.

The king brought the girl in before the queen and the prince, who were talking before the fire. But I have never met you, the prince said, smiling at the lovely girl. And I do remember visiting your father, the king. Why, that must have been while I was helping young Prince Stephen with his studies said the girl with the gracious smile of her own.

She is beautiful and she is wise, the prince whispered to the queen. She looks like a real princess and she acts like a real princess, but how can I be sure? We shall see, said the queen. We shall see if she is of royal blood. She said no more, but hurried away to prepare a room for the princess. Remove the bedclothes from the bed, she commanded one of the maids.

Bring twenty fir mattresses, she commanded a second, and bring me twenty soft downy quilts, she ordered a third. To the smallest of the maids, she said, and I want you to bring a small dried pea from the pantry. The queen placed the pea on a wooden slat of the bed. On top of it, she laid the twenty mattresses.

And then, one by one, she piled the twenty soft downy quilts on top of the mattresses. Now we shall see if she is a real princess, said the Queen as she smoothed down the last quilt. The Queen then showed the girl to her room and wished her a restful night. Early the next morning, the Queen and Prince waited for the girl to join them for breakfast.

When at last she appeared, they asked, Tell sighed.

I barely slept at all, she said. There was a hump in my bed that kept me tossing and turning all night. It was so hard that I'm quite black and blue this morning. And she shuddered, just thinking about the hump. You felt a small dried pea through twenty mattresses and twenty quilts, cried the prince.

Oh, you are indeed a real princess, for only a real princess could feel such a small hump. And then there was much joy in the kingdom. The king ordered the bells to be rung in every county. The queen ordered the royal cook to prepare a royal feast at once. And the prince and his real princess were married that very day and lived most happily ever after.

The end.

As a child, I loved this story for the 20 mattresses piled up high on the bed. I just thought it was a story about a prince and a princess getting married. Now, through the eyes of an adult, deeper meanings began to emerge, and I'm sharing these insights with you here now.

The essence of The Princess and the Pea is that a prince is looking for a princess who not only is beautiful and smart, but also has another special quality. This special quality is never specifically called out in the story. It's only ever implied when the princess sighs that she's barely slept at all from the hump in the bed the night before that kept her tossing and turning all night long.

Unknown to the princess, we know it was due to the small dried pea placed underneath the 20 quilts and mattresses. Do you know what this special quality is? It's sensitivity. Now, you might be wondering, is there a connection between sensitivity and stuttering? Yes, there is.

In my research, I came across a white paper called Temperamental Sensitivity in Children Who Stutter by Mary Elizabeth Euler, herself a speech language pathologist who also stutters.

She defines sensitivity as a temperamental and sensory responsiveness and susceptibility to people and the environment. The construct of temperamental sensitivity includes the following components, emotional sensitivity, reactivity, stress awareness and coping ability, sensitivity to time, pressure, noise, light, and touch. In this paper, she shares the results of her research study. Children who stutter were significantly more sensitive and vulnerable than non-stuttering children.

84 percent of the children who stutter fell in the highly sensitive range, as compared to 36 percent of the children who did not stutter. The paper goes on to state that in addition to heightened sensitivity, there is another biological predisposition seen in children who stutter. This predisposition is a behaviorally inhibited temperament, meaning to hold back.

Both of these predispositions are risk factors for the development of chronic stuttering. So now, this might be a clue as to why you might not have outgrown stuttering in childhood and has now persisted into adulthood.

So how does this trait of sensitivity influence the experience of stuttering? If you're a sensitive person, the heightened awareness of sensory information means you feel much more deeply on many levels. These sensations can be over stimulating and overwhelming. Here are some examples as it connects to stuttering.

For a child with a sensitive nature, stuttering can leave its mark as a traumatic and adverse childhood experience. With an overly cautious nature on the lookout for danger, a sensitive person worries about stuttering in future speaking situations. After feeling humiliated, a sensitive person may ruminate and get stuck playing the scenario over and over again in their mind.

For a sensitive person, being put on the spot feels very uncomfortable, and this pressure to perform can affect speech fluency. Even though the only constant thing in life is change, for a sensitive person, change can be terrifying and challenging to navigate.

I've always been very sensitive to the small dried pea of my life. My stutter. Our stutter is like that dried pea. And like the fairy tale princess, I can't tell you how many sleepless nights I had obsessing over my stutter. Either from an incident that day that I played over and over again in my head or losing sleep because I had a big presentation looming in the future.

Imagine for a second that the 20 quilts and mattresses piled high were all the layers of our personality, all the great things that make us wonderful and unique. Like the dried pea, we allow our stutter to overshadow everything about who we are. Focus so much on the dried pea, on our stutter. We keep tossing and turning, losing our sleep. Losing our sleep and inner peace. Now, I'm not at all downplaying the pain and struggle that comes with having a stutter. I know how deeply this impacts your life as it touches every aspect from your professional career and to your relationships. Like the Queen who had a secret idea of planning the small dried pea, to put the princess to a test navigating the world with a stutter, definitely tests you.

Stuttering is the biggest defining aspect of my life, shaping who I am and who I've become. Growing up with a stutter has also been the vehicle through which I've grown the most as a person in terms of personal development. here are a few strategies to start the process of self-discovery between sensitivity and stuttering.

As always, first, seek awareness. Until only a few years ago, I didn't know I was a highly sensitive person. Without this critical piece of information, I didn't have the full picture or awareness to understand myself. As a result, I didn't feel like I was like other people. I noticed that things always affected me much more differently than others.

And this, of course, went above and beyond stuttering. Now that I recognize the distinct traits that come with being a highly sensitive person, I don't beat myself up anymore like I used to. I acknowledge that I have a tendency for these traits within myself that influence my experiences. And that's okay.

Want to do a quick test for yourself? Which sensitivity traits describe you? Are you easily overwhelmed? A people pleaser? Self-conscious or self-focused? Tend to be a worrier? Can you be self-critical? Do you not relax well? Maybe you're unaware of your own needs. Or prone to feeling shame?

Do you prefer to avoid conflict? And do you hold back from expressing your emotions? Depending on how many traits that resonated with you here on a spectrum, of course, you might be a highly sensitive person. Another strategy you can do is Learn more about sensitivity. Knowledge really is power. There is so much you can learn more about sensitivity by reading up on it.

One of the books I recommend is called The Highly Sensitive Person, How to Thrive When the World Overwhelms You by Elaine N. Aaron. I do have a few more books to suggest, but in the spirit of not overwhelming you, I'll share these another time.

Another strategy is the importance of self-care. If you're a sensitive person, it can be so easy to become overwhelmed in this loud and noisy world, especially if you find yourself being stretched from one stressful speaking situation to another. It's for this reason that self-care can play an important role in helping you cope and manage with your everyday experience. Taking care of yourself that nurtures and supports you in healthy ways.

Now that I know I'm a highly sensitive person, I can embrace that this is part of my nature, adding another dimension to the experience of stuttering. With this new awareness, you can choose a different perspective about yourself as well to put stuttering in its place. Yes, stuttering might be a part of you.

Maybe more than you might like. But when you look at stuttering as only a small part of you, this small dried pea is no longer worth getting black and blue over anymore.