I’d like to share the sad news that our colleague Sandi Bojm, a longtime speech-language pathologist and counsellor in Vancouver, has passed away. Her funeral was held on September 16, 2026. My thoughts are with her husband, Morris, her children and grandchildren, and everyone who knew and loved her.
Before she passed, Sandi asked me to write something for our colleagues about her life and work. I want to honour that request, because she gave a great deal to people who stutter, and she gave a great deal to me.
Colleague and Mentor
I knew Sandi as a colleague and mentor. What I admire most is how seriously she took each person’s experience of stuttering, including the thoughts and feelings that can accompany it, the self-judgement some people experience, and its effects on everyday life.
Thoughts and feelings matter
When we met around 2011—some fifteen years ago—many of us still approached stuttering primarily as a speech issue. We knew thoughts and feelings mattered, but Sandi helped me appreciate their impact much more deeply. Even today, there is considerable misunderstanding about stuttering and how best to support people who stutter. To me, she was ahead of her time.
She told me she had gone back and earned another master’s degree, this time in counselling. An entire second degree. She wanted the skills to help people properly, and she went and got them. I know how delicate a balance it can be to help people who stutter effectively and ethically, and I admire the time, effort, and care she put into preparing herself for that work.
In a paper describing an unusual case, Sandi wrote about a woman who developed stuttering following withdrawal from a long-used medication. The woman had no previous history of stuttering. She was struggling with anxiety, shame, memory and language difficulties, and had become isolated and unable to work. For this woman, the direct fluency techniques Sandi tried made her stuttering worse.
Change of approach
Sandi changed her approach. Their work focused on helping the woman talk openly about her
experience, address anxiety, give herself time to find words and express one idea at a time, and gradually regain confidence in everyday activities. These included driving alone, reconnecting with friends and family, and speaking with strangers. Sandi described growing confidence and self-reliance, and the woman eventually returned to work after several years away.
What moves me about that account is the care behind it. Sandi paid attention to how the woman responded and adapted her work to meet her needs. That is the Sandi I remember.
BCAPS
Sandi also helped build the British Columbia Association of People who Stutter, or BCAPS, and organize its camp for children who stutter and their families. The camp gave them a place to be together, build confidence, and enjoy themselves without judgement or ridicule. In 2004, she shared work on both the camp and family systems approaches to stuttering at the conference of the Canadian Association of Speech-Language Pathologists and Audiologists.
I remember her generosity toward me, too. When I felt something was missing in my work with a client, I asked whether I could observe and learn as she worked with him. She welcomed me into that process. I was grateful that she respected my work and shared hers so openly. We continued talking about clients over the years.
Dedication
As I’ve come to understand more about the difficulties people who stutter can face, including discouragement and hurt from earlier experiences, my appreciation of Sandi’s dedication has only deepened. She took those experiences seriously and committed herself to learning how to help.
My hat is off to her. I’m grateful that she trusted me to share something of her work with our colleagues. And I’m grateful to Sandi herself—for her generosity, for what she taught me, and for the care she gave to people who stutter.
Read Sandi’s paper: Clinical Case of Stuttering Secondary to Abrupt Drug Withdrawal
James Burden is a speech-language pathologist who has worked with people who stutter throughout his career. His colleague and mentor, Sandi Bojm, helped him understand that meaningful support goes beyond speech itself—it means understanding and supporting the whole person.