Speech Therapy After Stroke or Brain Injury: What to Expect
Recovering communication skills after a stroke or traumatic brain injury (TBI) can be overwhelming. Even if your thoughts are clear, you may struggle to get the words out. Difficulties might include forming sounds, finding the right words, or putting together complete sentences.
What Types of Communication Can Be Affected
A stroke or brain injury can affect many parts of communication, including:
• Speech clarity: Slowed or weakened tongue and mouth movements may result in slurred or hard-to-understand speech.
• Speech motor planning: With apraxia of speech, your brain knows what it wants to say, but the muscles of the mouth don’t always follow the plan.
• Understanding language: You might find it hard to follow along when too much information is given at once.
• Word-finding difficulties: It can feel like the word is “on the tip of your tongue,” but you just can’t get it out.
• Cognitive challenges: Memory, attention, and planning skills may also be affected, which impacts communication.
What are Aphasia, Dysarthria, and Apraxia?
• Aphasia affects your ability to understand or express language. You may mix up words, use the wrong ones, or have trouble understanding others.
• Dysarthria is a motor speech disorder caused by weakened or uncoordinated muscles, leading to slurred or slow speech.
• Apraxia of speech involves difficulty planning and coordinating the movements needed for speech, even though the muscles are not weak.
How Speech Therapy Helps Recovery
A speech-language pathologist (SLP) evaluates your communication strengths and challenges. Therapy focuses on:
• Retraining the brain to improve speech production and language recall
• Practicing structured activities that target memory, naming, or sentence building
• Developing compensatory strategies (e.g., using gestures or pictures)
• Including family and caregivers in sessions to help them support communication at home
SLPs help create a personalized therapy plan that may include daily routines, functional communication tasks, and consistent feedback. The goal is to help you communicate with more ease and confidence in everyday life.
Get Speech and Communication Rehabilitation Support
If you or a loved one is navigating life after a stroke or brain injury, speech therapy can play a vital role in recovery. At SpeechLab Toronto, we offer online therapy for teens and adults across Ontario. Book a free consultation today to start your rehabilitation journey.