Freedom of speech is a privilege which many in the U.S cannot actually attain, on account of speech impediments. Junior Sheila Smith has a speech impediment that she has felt has been holding her back in life.

Sheila, however, has recently become a small-town celebrity when she appeared in a documentary with Eagles Pro Bowl running back Darren Sproles. The documentary revolves around her impediment of stuttering, and how she has overcome its “struggles” as well as cope with it. Sproles himself has had a stuttering problem all his life. The road which lead to this eventual interview all started with something that her mom had heard.

“My mom first told me about a director that was looking for kids with a stuttering problem, so she told her about me and so she [the director] interviewed me. We talked about my past and how I was bullied and teased about how the way I talked,” explained Sheila. After two weeks or so, Sheila eventually heard back from the director, and found out that she had been picked out of about one hundred kids for this documentary.

Initially, “I was happy and shocked, and I couldn’t believe it,” Sheila claims. The documentary aired on USA network on Friday, February 6, 2015 at 7:00 PM.

Originally filmed in November, Sheila has been receiving wonderful feedback from its recording long before anyone at the school even knew about her documentary debut. The documentary would prove to be very beneficial to Sheila personally, and socially.

“I feel like by doing the documentary, I felt like I can just overcome my problem and learn to be okay with it,” Sheila went on to explain how she had, “always been very insecure about it [stuttering] It’s been a very difficult thing for me all my life.”

Sheila is in fact a very special case in her family, as no one in her family has had stuttering problems before. This may have added to the frustration that comes with a stutter.

Some people even question Sheila about why she stutters which after a while became quite irritating, “I just don’t think that people don’t understand what it is because they don’t have it,” Sheila reasons.

“Before [the documentary] it [dealing with a stutter] was very hard, and there was a lot of frustration because if you want to say something and you can’t, it makes you so frustrated like, ‘oh my gosh I can’t get it out,’ but now it doesn’t really bother me anymore.”

The talk with Sproles gave Sheila a different view of herself and her “problem.” Before November, Sheila described her stuttering as, “Seeing this block, which held me back from so many things that I wanted to do,” and so reflecting on her experience with Sproles, “I’m grateful for it. I am very grateful that I’d done it.”

This documentary was not the usual back and forth between a host and a guest, but an actual conversation and moving moment between two people who had common struggles. After being with Sproles all day during filming, what Sheila took away was that “He was very nice, he had like the same problem I had but it was different from my stutter. He does have a stutter, and he told me what it was like for him to be a stutterer.”

During the documentary Sproles and Sheila made anti-bullying t-shirts together, as they were both bullied because of their “condition of speech.”

Sproles, understanding where Sheila was coming from gave her not only advice on dealing with a stutter, but dealing with life. This is an area of the interview which personally aided and touched Sheila, and has helped her to see her life in a new way.

“He was teased too as a child, and he has taught me to believe in myself, and not let anything stop you. Because just because you’re a stutterer it doesn’t mean you can’t do anything in life,” Sheila beamed.

Sheila relates to Sproles because she feels he has been through the same thing she is going through, “If it wasn’t for this documentary… I would’ve still been anti-social, like I still wouldn’t talk to people, I still would’ve been quiet.”

The reason that this would happen is because, being self-conscious about her stuttering Sheila would have continued to attempt to avoid conversations and talking, but ever since her conversation with Sproles, she has felt a new level of confidence. “I would’ve still kept to myself, because I wouldn’t have any self confidence in me,” Sheila said.

Since November, Sheila has been able to cope and attempt to overcome her speech difficulty, “A lot of people tell me to take my time when I talk because sometimes when I try to force it out of me it’s like I can’t even breathe like I’m suffocating myself. And I don’t know why I do that sometimes… It’s just a hard thing to overcome in life.”

Sheila is very thankful to her mother, and director with whom she would have not been able to overcome her social anxiety and shyness so well.

After her interview for this article Sheila just wanted to say, “I am just so glad that I am able to do the film, and it would probably help me in a lot of ways to just be okay with myself, and try to cope with it. I may never overcome it, so I just have to learn to accept it.”

Sheila had a message that she wanted to relay to other people who have stutters, or difficulties in any way by saying, “That just because you have a stutter, doesn’t mean you can’t do anything in life. You have to believe in yourself, because I believe the only person that is stopping you (from doing anything) is yourself.”