(A note~ I changed the video in the previous blog on Education and Malala)

As you know, I’m dyslexic.  I thought I’d pass along this list of symptoms for those who may be similarly affected:

1. Known in family tree.

2.  Not speaking by 1st birthday.

3.  Twisted Oral Speech – Multiple Syllables  (like saying am-in-al for animal or pasghetti for spaghetti — my daughter did this and I thought it was just a cute part of being a little one “dutchy” as my Mom would call it.)

4.  Stuttering in early years

5.  Cluttering early

6.  Articulation Difficulties m/n, r/l, even in adults

7.  Chronic Ear Infections  (I would say chronic earaches, too.  Get this–many of us on the mercury poisoning list have earaches or history of ear infections.  When I’m chelating, I always get an earache.)

8.  Can’t master tying shoes.

9.  Trouble with left/right

10.  Late to establish a dominant hand.   (I’m not sure why it is important to establish a dominant hand.  I would think after all the years of abuse connected with forcing left handed children to use their right hands, that the thought of a dominant hand being important would die away….)

11.  Mixed dominance w/hand per task.  (Again, I don’t know why such importance is put on this–)

12.  Can’t say or write alphabet in sequence.

13.  Difficulty spelling last name.  (Ha.  Try one with four syllables)

14.  Address/Phone # difficulty

15.  Sequence, Names, and Sounds of alphabet (where one has to keep starting over from the beginning to name all the letters)

16.  Sequence Days of the Week and Month  (I solved this by creating a picture in my mind of the months and the days of the week–the days look connected like a telephone pole line.  The months look like a calendar in my head.)

17.  Multiplication facts (Math is difficult because there is no reason.  Dyslexics need to have a reason.  This really slammed me–one of the things I told my calculus adviser was that the instructors tell you a problem. I wanted to know “why” .  I knew by the look she gave me that there was a reason they didn’t do this (in Indiana University, their math program featured books written by women mathematicians that explained it in a way that I (and probably other dyslexics) could understand.  We want to know why and if we don’t know why, it gets in the way of solving the problem.

18.  Knows a word on page 1, but not on page 3.  In the excellent book I got from my PUBLIC Library, it explained that dyslexics get stuck on words that they can’t associate with a picture.  This was my daughter’s difficulty, too.  I would point to the word “the” and then turn the page and point to it again, and she couldn’t recognize it, even though she just looked at it.  This was because a, an, and the don’t stand for any particular object.  She could remember words like “ball” because it stood for this round thing that bounced.

19.  Won’t try to sound out unknown words.

20.  Terrible Spelling – often no vowels.  This is the opposite of me–I was an excellent speller.  I have lost the ability, however, with the mercury poisoning.  I misspell words that I know. (updated 5.2015: I am now recognizing and spelling words better….so there’s progress in that direction.)

21.  Terrible Penmanship–dysgraphia.  (Again, the opposite of me–I have very nice penmanship.  This is explained that dyslexics are highly creative–supposedly, the right side of their brains are larger.)

22.  Impacts Visual Memory–3D is the gifted area

23.  Handwriting posture – Often head on desk or turning paper.  Yup, that would be me.

24.  Extreme difficulty with cursive. (Again, not a problem for this dyslexic — nice cursive writing.)

25.  Reversals after 2 years of writing practice instruction.

26.  Writing Conventions are very poor, but content is okay.  (Poor capitalization and paragraphing.  Dyslexics need to write first, take a break, and then come back to edit later.)

27.  Word retrieval issues

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Seriously, writing this entry, I’ve had to re-type several times because of the backwards letters.  Being dyslexic requires more energy–hence the reason they tend to want to give up in frustration. (I’m also chelating, and it’s amazing how much worse my symptoms are….so yeah, you know what I’m thinking–is dyslexia related to mercury/heavy metal poisoning?)

It also should be noted that dyslexics are often treated as if they are stupid, but evidence proves that is not correct.  Dyslexics are highly intelligent.  My daughter would have been branded stupid for the rest of her life if I had listened to her teacher.  I just want to encourage parents that you are the best judge of your child, and to listen to your instincts.