Trouble with T or D (stop consonants) Followed by Trill

[RyeSigh]

I'm new to getting serious about learning Portuguese (BR PT, specifically) and, while I can trill just fine 90% of the time, names like Pedro or Patricia give me all kinds of trouble. My tongue refuses to work properly if there's a T or a D before a trill. Any tips? If context helps, I'm from the southwest of the US. Thanks in advance!

[DangerDave2010]

as an exercise, try inserting a vowel between them. Then repeat it progressively faster, untill the vowel disappears: tarataratarataratratratratra... or diridiridiridiridridridridri.... etc

[Pilikku]

Try imitating sounds cars make like kids do. (at least in this country)
"drrun drrun drrun" first they might say "durrn durrn"

[Jar-Ptitsa]

I find it really difficult as well, if it's the Spanish R that you mean.

for me, R is ok in Dutch and German becuase if you do the French one it's ok. In English I can sometimes say the R, but like you with certain letters before, it makes it much more difficult.

R is a difficult letter

[tastyonions]

Generally in Romance languages an R after a T or D will not be a true trill, but rather an alveolar tap. Remember to make T and D dental rather than alveolar, so in "tr," for example, your tongue will move backward a bit from T to R rather than staying in the same place. Also, I think Portuguese does the same thing as Spanish where post-vocalic D becomes an approximant (like the TH in English "them"), which is definitely easier to combine with R than a "true" D.

[garyb]

I know it's probably not much comfort, but I find this to be the easiest place to do a trill because the preceding T or D works as a kind of "launchpad": the tongue is already near the right place and as you release the stop the air sets off the trill or tap. I find it more difficult between two vowels.

I'd imagine that the exercises suggested above will help, similar things helped me at the start.