Emily Blunt struggled with a stutter growing up — and ended up finding a way to cope with it in a way that changed her life.
The Jungle Cruise actor says she was around six or seven years old when she began to notice that she had a stutter like several other members of her family.
While dealing with the biological speech impediment in middle school, Emily says a teacher helped her discover that her stutter went away when she was acting and encouraged her to audition for the school play.
"It was just a bit shocking the first time I was able to speak, you know, doing a silly voice or an accent pretending to be someone else," Emily shared with People.
Although she says the realization wasn't exactly "why [she's] ventured into acting" as an adult, it was "a sort of invitation into speaking fluently for one of the first times."
"If you can't express yourself, you can't be yourself. And there's something very poignant in freeing people of the grip of a speech impediment, because it's like a sort of imposter that lives in your body," Emily explained.
That's why Emily says she's become so involved in advocating for others with a stutter, partnering with the American Institute for Stuttering to speak openly about "a disability people don't know much about."
"People don't talk about [it] enough if it hasn't got enough exposure, and millions of people around the world struggle with it," Emily said.
And considering it's "very often a disability that people bully and make fun of," Emily feels that it's of utmost importance that she continues to speak about it.
"I think, to raise awareness about what it's really about, and that there's this soft place for you to land in this amazing organization. It's a big deal for me to be here," Emily concluded.
Head here to learn more about the American Institute for Stuttering.
