Shareable version of my STUTTERING post

[OneGrassRoot]

We’ll be hearing from President Biden again soon. More people need to gain more insight (and media needs to stop bullying). Thx for the prompt, Sogo.


https://medium.com/@denapatrick/its-stuttering-not-cognitive-decline-1ef3c39cfb4f

[lapfog_1]

1. it isn't stuttering that bothers me

It is this...

"Aphasia is a symptom of some other condition, such as a stroke or a brain tumor. A person with aphasia may: Speak in short or incomplete sentences. Speak in sentences that don't make sense. Substitute one word for another or one sound for another."

We have all seen Joe do this from time to time.

Once in a while we all do it, especially with people's names, sometimes with names of objects. "Bring me that pear" when you point at an apple. Often the names imply a similar sounding name or even a name that is the opposite meaning of the name you wanted to say.

This is not stuttering.

I'm not a doctor, I don't know if Biden suffers Aphasia. The reporting is that this started 6 months ago and has gotten progressively worse, triggered by lack of sleep and stress. Good days and bad days. And a very common condition in elderly people.

Often people with this condition "cover" by trailing off... halting before saying the wrong word ( they know it's wrong, they simply can't think of the right word to use ). Joe's catch phrase at these moments is "well, anyway". I've seen him do this in a number of unscripted speeches and interviews. Does that mean he HAS aphasia... again I am not a doctor.

But I will say something that I know for damn sure... every time Joe speaks in public I hold my breath a little bit, with a cold feeling in the pit of my stomach... please god don't let him make a huge gaff today. And I bet everyone at DU that loves Joe has the same feeling.

I don't feel that way with any other democratic leader.

It is the same feeling I have when I watch my college basketball team play on TV ( go Jayhawks! ). I almost can't watch for fear they will screw up.

Trump's suffers from a different but similar issue when speaking "off the cuff". He probably has aphasia AND other issues that make his unscripted speaking a real train wreck.. incomprehensible. perfect example... he hears that bleach will kill the virus for sure... and that translates into "maybe we can inject bleach into the body and kill Covid". A real "Dumb an Dumber" moment. He is not realizing that whoever said "bleach will kill" meant that if you use bleach to clean a surface of an object, you are unlikely to contract the virus from that object if you then handle it.

[indigovalley]

3. Not saying those doctors aren't voicing some valid concerns..

I'm not a doctor or qualified to debate that. But several doctors have also appeared in articles proclaiming that Biden has Parkinsons despite having no contact with the man and never examining him. And that turned out to be a false story about the specialist who was visiting the White House.

Cognitive function become a medical focus when you are elderly. I am only 67 and I get a short cognitive test at the doctor now as a routine check. Biden reminds me of my own dad who died at at 91. In his 80's he was very much like Biden is now--slower in step, a little more forgetful, and less forceful in voice-but he was largely cognitively intact. Like Biden he would occasionally misspeak or lose his train of thought but he was never out of it. Never. It was only when he reached 90 and was getting very frail that we could see he was starting to cognitively decline.

All people age differently. Biden is in his 80's so some of the things we see are normal for that age. I also feel his stuttering likely affects his communication more now because he is older.

[OneGrassRoot]

5. kicking to test - I can't see my own posts in the GD list! Weird n/t