A regular person who would have heard Mordechai Alush (25) speak, would not have noticed at the first moment that this was a person who suffered until a few years ago from a not-so-simple stutter.
After years of stuttering from birth, Alush - a former officer in the Magellan unit, the Givati patrol and a classified unit - has managed to overcome the flaw in his speech, and now he is even studying for a life of lectures and public speaking.
"I stutter from birth at a medium level plus," he says in an interview on the occasion of the International Day for Stuttering Awareness.
"I could talk to friends on a daily basis, but with all sorts of tricks. I avoided getting into stressful situations, asking questions in class and speaking in front of an audience."
When he enlisted in the commando unit, Alush discovered that he was in a very challenging situation.
"Suddenly you can't avoid the stress. You're constantly at a high pace, you have to talk, react. Everything gets more complex."
At this point Mordechai decided he was going into battle against the stuttering.
David Harris teaches stuttering, Photo: Dr. Fluence Institute
"Before I enlisted, I heard about someone who was in the Magellan's unit and was given tools to deal with the stuttering at the Dr. Fluence Institute in Jerusalem. I said 'come on, let's try'. My parents spent all my life on treatments and did not spare me a penny, but nothing worked. I hoped that maybe it would work. "During his internship, Alush underwent treatments, performed exercises at the expense of his free time, and was able to overcome much of his difficulty.
As a man who stuttered most of his life, his biggest challenge was standing in front of his fighters, first as a young officer in the Givati Regiment and then in the classified unit. "It was very challenging. I had to implement the new speech only a short time after the change occurred." Alush has now been discharged from the IDF, and is studying for a bachelor's degree in education at a yeshiva as well.
Alush: "Before I enlisted I heard about someone who was in the Magellan unit and was given tools to deal with the stuttering. I said 'come on, let's try'. I was hoping it might work."
At first, Mordechai refused to be interviewed, but agreed on the occasion of Stuttering Awareness Day, hoping to get the message across that the challenge could be overcome.
"When I was asked to be interviewed, I automatically did not agree. It is not pleasant to reveal this matter to people. But I did decide to be exposed after a conversation with my mother, who said that if one child knew there was a solution to stuttering and that this challenge did not stop him - I did mine. For my exposure. "
"People need to understand that speech fluency is not the most critical thing about stuttering, but the ability to speak without avoiding it," explains David Harris, director of the Dr. Fluence Institute.
It is possible and necessary to change the equation and improve the life of the stutterer dramatically. "
