Dyslexia still haunts me
When adults share the emotional pain caused by dyslexia, and how it continues to impact them even as adults, it will give you the anger and courage needed to fight hard for laws that require early screening and early intervention.
I’m 23 years old now, and I barely graduated from high school. My fiancee and I just watched your dyslexia video, and the story you told about your nephew Ben made me cry. It brought back many painful memories. I am like Ben, but unlike Ben, I never got the right help. I would like to tell you my story, and then I’d like to ask you a few questions.
In kindergarten, I had to walk home. It was only about three or four blocks, but I would often get lost. Also, I still remember getting criticized by my teachers, classmates, and even my own parents when I was falling behind in reciting my ABC’s, my 1-10’s, and even my phone number and address.
They almost retained me in Kindergarten, but my mother talked them out of it.
In first grade, I started to learn to read, but again, I was falling behind. All the way through school, I feared my turn to read in class. It’s funny how good memories are sometimes forgotten, but bad memories never go away. When I was trying to learn to read, I can still remember my father telling me that I was lazy, and I just wasn’t trying. I guess my tears and frustration weren’t enough proof for him to see how hard I really was trying.
When I finally got tested for dyslexia in 3rd grade, they put me into “Special Ed.” If you ask a child what Special Ed means, they will probably say “retarded.” That’s what my peers called me, and that’s what I thought I was.
My parents sent me to many programs, and spent a lot of money. Yet I’ve held a grudge against my parents for years; I felt they failed me and didn’t try hard enough to get the right type of help. That’s because after years of “help,” I was still the same.
I struggled all the way through high school and barely graduated. In my junior year, the state created a High School Graduation Exam. In order to graduate, you had to pass 3 tests: reading, writing, and math. You could take them 3 times, but if you don’t pass by the end of high school, you only got an “Attendance” certificate. The first time I took it, I somehow passed the reading test. But I failed math and writing.
To this day, I can’t do math. I still mess up on simple things such as adding and subtracting. I still don’t know my multiplication tables. I’ve tried to learn them for years, but I just can’t remember them. I’ll have all the fours mastered one night, but when I try them again the next day, I’ll only remember a few of them. By the following day, I won’t remember any of them.
So I switched to a vocational high school where you could take construction electricity to earn math credits. In that hands-on class, I was a super star.
But I still could not pass the math portion of the high school exit exam — or the writing part, which you had to do by hand and they graded it on spelling, punctuation, and neatness of handwriting.
Fortunately, many parents in the district (whose kids could not pass the test) fought the district and got them to withdraw the test. So I did graduate after all — with a D average.
After high school, I went from job to job, but I wasn’t happy. I needed a skill, so I turned to the military. I took the ASVAB for the Coast Guard, and once again, I almost failed it. But I scored just high enough to get into a mechanics position.
But Basic Training was a nightmare. I could not memorize and retain information, marching left versus right was almost impossible, and I still could not write down anything. In the end I had a mental breakdown, and got discharged.
That was two years ago, and since then, I’ve been going from one job I hated to the next.
But last January, my finance gave me an ultimatum. “Go back to school and try, or I’m going to leave you.”
So I’m back in school in the diesel mechanics program.
Although the Disabilities Office has provided some software, more time on tests, and a note taker for each of my classes, they are not teaching me how to overcome my dyslexia.
I still can’t spell, do multiplication (or most other math), memorize anything, tell my left from my right, or find my errors when I write. I even make mistakes when filling out a job application.
Yet there is so much I can do. Right now, I work as an assistant maintenance person at the fire department, and I’m good. Really good. I can fix just about anything.
Yet that’s not what this world wants.
I want help to overcome my dyslexia so badly. I will try anything. I just want to be like everyone around me.
If it’s too late for me, then I need to know what to do to help my children when I have them. I do not want them to feel like I do now.
Hopeless, helpless, and sad.
Dyslexia is inherited
Many people are still not aware that dyslexia is inherited. It strongly runs in family trees.
That lack of awareness causes this:
After 3 years of trying to figure out my daughter’s learning challenges, I am now convinced that she is dyslexic.
I am sick to my stomach that although I knew my husband is dyslexic, I never made the connection. I did not know it is an inherited condition.
My very bright daughter will be entering 6th grade soon, reading 3 years below her grade level.
And it causes this:
I am dyslexic my father was dyslexic my older son is dyslexic. could my 9 yr old son be dyslexic.
we have been trying to get an IEP sence frist grade (he in 3rd now) we where told unless he has failing grades for 2 consexative years no IEP.
i cant help him with his school work.
im afraid thay are pushing him through school and he will end up an out of control teen — like me.
Parents, if you know dyslexia runs in your family tree, and your second or third grader has terrible spelling when writing sentences and stories, and is a slow inaccurate reader who cannot easily sound out unknown words, take action now.
I just found your website today. I am the mom of a second grader and I think he may be dyslexic because my son’s father, aunt, and grandmother are all dyslexic.
I questioned his kindergarten and first grade teachers about dyslexia. Each teacher assured me he was age appropriate in his learning.
But towards the middle of first grade, he scored below the average on the DIBELS test and qualified for reading intervention. I signed him up for it, thinking it would help.
I also worked with him all summer in an attempt to get him up to the same level as his classmates.
Despite that, his second grade teacher expressed concern about his reading, writing, and spelling on his progress report.
So I took him to a center for an assessment. He scored low on phonemic awareness and fluency, but very high on comprehension. He puzzled the assessor because even though he did not read the passage very accurately, he was able to answer the comprehension questions. He also scored high in listening comprehension.
Yet reading, spelling, and writing are so exhausting to my child that it is painful to watch. He wants to read, he is motivated to read, but he isn’t reading the words. He does seem to know some sight words but he mostly scans the page looking for clues and guesses at reading.
I am very interested in learning how to teach my child. My background is not in teaching, but I am more than willing to work hard, and I am very motivated.
Take Action
Parents, when you see many of the early warning signs of dyslexia in your child, take action — as this parent finally did.
Debbie has always been an extremely bright child.
She loved preschool, but not kindergarten. She had extreme trouble with sounds, particularly vowels. She could never do the worksheets where you have to fill in the vowel sound. We had her hearing tested, which was fine. I did Hooked on Phonics and every other phonics thing I could lay my hands on.
By the end of second grade, her reading had progressed somewhat (but was nothing like my older daughter’s reading). Debbie just couldn’t seem to pick it up, and she could not sound out anything. She skipped many words (even the small ones, like he, at, to, it), and I was confused when she said a totally different word than the one on the page (vacation instead of trip, frog instead of toad, etc.) She spent a lot of time looking at the pictures.
And she couldn’t spell at all. Her teachers said her inventive spelling was horrible, even though we worked on her spelling every night at home for at least an hour.
At the end of second grade, she became so anxious about school that we asked them to test her for a learning disability. They claimed she did not have one (only inattentive ADD). So we decided to homeschool to lower her anxiety.
I have worked with her intensely with many different reading programs during the past two years of homeschool. Reading exhausts her, and she starts making all kinds of dyslexic mistakes after reading for less than an minute or two.
One day this summer, we were discussing a short book we had read about wishes. I asked Debbie about her fondest wish. She looked at me and said, “To be able to read, Mama. REALLY read like Lisa can. I want to read big books, like Harry Potter. But I don’t think I will ever get that wish.”
Right after that, I made an appointment to have her tested privately for dyslexia.
By the way, she still can’t spell. Neither can my father. He is a well-respected professional in his field. He never reads books. And he has always used a dictaphone to compose letters because his spelling is horrific. In fact, at his retirement party, they gave him a plaque that had misspelled words all over it — as a joke.
Bright Solutions for Dyslexia 