Growing up, I always knew something was off. From how much I struggled in literacy classes, to being told off whenever I didn’t face the teacher. It felt like everything I did, always annoyed my teachers. Going into high school was the same. At first, I excelled in my classes, only truly struggling with English. I could never get my head around how to analyse text on paper, physically writing down my answers took away the information that I had. So, I preferred maths and science, their formulas ensured me that I wasn’t getting anything wrong due to a differing opinion of the text.
The unspoken thing beneath all of that was I just wanted to write. I wanted nothing more than to write and publish books for a living. English was what I struggled with, yet it was needed for what I wanted to do. Despite all the struggles I had with the subject I pushed through. If I didn’t understand how, it was being taught in class, I looked for other resources from other schools that gave me that formula I desired. And not only did I find them, that year I got the highest close ready result they had seen at National 5, and that was just in the prelims. I scored lower in the final exam but still I had not only passed but passed highly. Even to this day that is one of my greatest achievements.
Then higher hit. All of a sudden, the subjects that I found easy the previous year were challenging. I started falling behind in maths because despite how many times I asked. The teacher could not explain the information in a new way I could process. I remember describing the feeling to people as ‘It felt like up until now I was always a step above what I was learning, now it’s overtaken me and I'm a step below.’
My worst fear was coming true, I was going to fail my exams. Despite studying hard, even though at that time I never knew how to truly study, I still don’t either, I failed myself.
I never knew why everything was so hard. Why I had started struggling so much more until I talked to my aunt. I had suspicions about my ADHD at the time, it was covid I was in university, and I hated what I was doing and couldn’t motivate myself to do anything for it. As I explained why I struggled, my aunt related. It was the first time anyone had found a reason within my confusion.
Dyslexia. Everything I had struggled with from English was due to me being Dyslexic. Undiagnosed for 19 years. Still undiagnosed to this date, however we know it’s there. Finally, I had an answer, I knew why I struggled. I had an actual processing issue that prevented me from putting the information down onto the paper. It was why I skipped words when reading or writing. Once I had the answer, when I looked back. I had been asked if I was dyslexic before but had never been assessed. I can only wonder why.
Soon other things started to click into place, I was also autistic. Know that I was able to start making accommodations for myself. Ensuring I had always noise cancelling headphones on me, bringing my laptop to college to ensure that I could take notes if needed. You’re not alone, there are always more people struggling with the same thing than you think. Everyone’s story is different, no matter if you’re self-diagnosed, undiagnosed or professionally diagnosed. No one is stupid, there is a cause for everything you’ve just not figured it out yet.