What comes to mind when you see the word Dyslexia? You don’t have to be PC, I won’t be offended. What honestly comes to your mind as to what it means or is? Or is it a confusing word that is unclear as to what it means/is?

The word dyslexia has been around for about 130 years. It has had a lot of unhelpful ‘labels’ attached to it. Originally thought to be the product of brain disease, the ‘diagnostic criteria’ has evolved and still is evolving. Use of words like disabled have also been used. Another common term used was as word blindness by ophthalmologists (in the early days of identifying Dyslexia) and it kept that label for a long time. It was not until the 1960s that psychology started to look at dyslexia more closely. But then, ideas of it being a middle class excuse for children not doing well caused huge damage to the way children were thought about. It has also been labelled a myth. The UK government refused, for years, to acknowledge it.

My personal experience is that I live in an exhausting world. My brain does not work in a way that makes anything easy because of the things I do struggle with. I am hugely organised, a learnt skill as that was not always the case. But it takes a lot of work and concentration. Conversely, I lose things as well all the time. Keys, phone, rarely know where they are. I get so frustrated with myself. That appears to be the nature of my dyslexia, huge strengths alongside huge deficits or difficulties.

Read the full article, here about my personal account of living as a dyslexic over at my free Substack publication

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