Guest Author - Terrie Lynn Bittner

When I was a child, I had a secret. I was stupid. Well, I thought I was, and I thought that it was very important that no one ever find out. My IQ scores placed me in programs for gifted children, but nothing seemed to add up. Math baffled me. I couldn’t write a readable paper, even though I got an A for content. My desk was messy, my homework was wrinkled if it wasn’t lost, and it had holes in it from major erasing efforts. I couldn’t master the eraser either. I had trouble following along when a teacher talked for very long. I couldn’t remember things involving rote learning. I was a klutz. I couldn’t write fast or for very long. I couldn’t tell right from left. I got lost, I reversed numbers, I forgot names…the list of strange things only I knew about myself was long.

On the other hand, I was reading before I started kindergarten. In fifth grade, I was reading Jane Eyre along with Nancy Drew. I could hold my own in a political discussion with adults. I preferred the adult section of the library. I read encyclopedias for fun. I taught myself to diagram sentences because it looked interesting. I wrote novels and poetry when other kids wrote paragraphs. Most kids teased me about being a brain. My teachers lectured me about being an underachiever, lazy, unmotivated and even a liar.

I was confused. Again and again I heard, “You have the highest IQ in the school. There is no excuse for the work you do-or don’t do. You are so lazy and you just don’t try.” But I did try. I cried over my homework night after night. Finally I decided that there was only one answer. I really was stupid. I didn’t know why a stupid grade school student liked Shakespeare, adult poetry and literature, or why she would prefer non-fiction to fiction, but the tests were wrong. Since I took great pride in my brain, I lived in terror that someone would find out the truth. I stopped doing homework, stopped studying, stopped trying. With any luck, people would just continue to yell at me for being lazy. I could cope with being thought lazy.

It wasn’t until I was an adult and a doctor told me that my daughter had dysgraphia, a learning disability similar to dyslexia, that I understood. As he ticked off the symptoms, I silently thought, “I have that. I do that. That’s me.” Now I understood. I had a learning disability. I was so relieved to know that I was not stupid. On the outside, nothing changed, but inside, I was dramatically different. I was an intelligent person. Now, in my efforts to help my children adjust to their own physical and learning disabilities, I had to work through my feelings about myself and my challenges.

I soon realized that I could learn to do anything, but that I couldn’t learn to do it the way others did. Everything would always be harder for me, and take more effort. I told my children that this was not fair, but it was reality. I tried to set the example by starting to do things I had always been afraid to do. I took an algebra class. The day I walked into that classroom, I was literally and visibly shaking. The teacher, whom I later learned taught classes on math phobia, invited me to meet with her in her office. She said I couldn’t come to class shaking so hard every week. Together, we analyzed my problems with math, and figured out work-arounds. When I got my first A on a test, my children put my test on the refrigerator door for all to see. When I got an A in the class, they decided that perhaps they could do math too.

As a parent, it was my responsibility to come to terms with my self-esteem problems, which did not go away instantly with the diagnosis. I still prefer to hide my faults, worrying that I won’t be loved or respected if I’m not perfect. I have to work at admitting who I am. However, I know that I can’t help my children if I don’t remember who I am.

I once had a disabled child in my Primary class. I told the preschoolers that God had sent each of us to earth to be part of His plan. He gave each of us everything we needed to do our part in that plan. Everyone has things that are easy and things that are hard. Which things were easy or hard did not matter or say anything about how special we are. It was something that was easier to say than to believe, but to help my children, I had to learn to believe this. I had to accept who I was, be willing to ask for help when I needed it, and be able to laugh at my faults.

At first I did this just when I was being watched by my children, because I had to be the example. Eventually I realized that I was a better example if I believed in what I was doing enough to do it all the time. I’m not perfect, but I’m improving.

Next week we will discuss the gifts your child’s learning disability brings him. The following week we will conclude this series as we discuss other ways to help our children succeed in spite of-and even because of-a learning disability of their own.


Living with a Learning Disability