I work with quite a few school-aged kids who stutter at a private practice. I do teach fluency and modification techniques, but in a completely neutral "this is for your own information and you can use them if/when you feel the need" way. We practice the strategies and I make sure the kids can explain and demonstrate them, but I've found that they usually don't use strategies independently in or out of sessions, and I'm perfectly fine with that. Most of the therapy focuses on learning about stuttering, self-advocacy, acceptance, and reducing secondary behaviors if the child has them. My fluency clients have mild to moderate stutters and are doing great by every clinical metric.
The problem I'm running into over and over again is the parents. The vast majority of them are very bothered by their child's stutter. They turn disfluencies into a big deal, even while admitting that the disfluencies don't bother their child at all. I've sent home informational handouts and resources, explained that stuttering is variable and can't be cured, described some strategies and how they could be useful in theory but are not always useful in practice, and explained that the goal for treatment is to have their child speak openly and confidently, regardless of fluency. I swear it all goes in one ear and out the other. They don't seem to believe me that stuttering can't be cured, yet also don't question my skills as an SLP (at least not to my face) and take their child elsewhere or demand to work with another therapist.
I have a few kids who complain that their parents are constantly asking them to repeat themselves at home, to say things fluently or use their strategies, and are interrupting their conversations and frustrating the kids, which breaks my heart. I've worked on self-advocacy with all of the kids and none of them report any difficulties in school, with friends, with other people in the community, but they also come from cultures where self-advocacy can be viewed as disrespecting your parents/elders, so they just have to sit there and deal with their parents stigmatizing their speech. I don't know what else, if anything, I can do to help.
I honestly find it difficult to empathize with these parents. Like yes, it can be frustrating that your child is "different" in some way, but if they're thriving, why do the tiny differences matter? As SLPs we work with some people who have severe communication disabilities, who can't functionally communicate at all, who need constant support...and here is a parent complaining that their kid said "b-ball" instead of "ball" one time in an hour long session. I feel like they need psychological counseling or family therapy rather than any more information from me, but I can't exactly refer them out. Anyone have any advice?