Hacker News Reader

Comment by krschultz | Hacker News Reader

Shameless plug: if you know anyone with Dyslexia or other learn & attention issues, send them to https://www.understood.org. It's a non-profit with many free resources for people trying to overcome these challenges.

View on HN

Thank you for the link. I'm 60 and have suffered with Dyslexia all my life.

I do well today thanks to spelling correction and Audio Books. But it is a struggle. There are "English Nazis" everywhere. I hear thing like "You might get promoted if you would play attention to your spelling."

Most of my special Ed friends flip burgers even with 140+ IQs.

I'm not dyslexic, but I've also experienced a similar attitude towards spelling. It's something I've always struggled with (I tend to think faster than I write, so frequently muddle words together, and words tend to 'look fine' even if I know the correct spelling - writing this I typed 'thinker' instead of 'think faster', and something like 'wierd' wouldn't stand out to me without spell-check). Fortunately it's never held me back, and deson't effect, e.g., reading, but I've definitely encountered people with an attitude along the lines of "You can't spell, therefore are an idiot" which can be fustrating.

I think I have a mild form of dyslexia, and I am the same way. I can type the wrong word correctly, but thought the right word. I can repeatedly swap some words for each other, like it for he, and he for it. Spell checking works very well for me, but if I picked the wrong word it didn't help. I also make many of the classic mistakes like there and their. Also use of apostrophes if I am not careful.

I don't think it has seriously held me back, but I think I have begun to notice a more subtle way it has held be back.

I am mgrennan's son.

My father has trouble reading despite being really smart otherwise, and unfortunately it's gotten him to think he's not smart. I'd love to show this to him, but my only concern is that everything is geared towards parents to help their children, and I don't want to demean him with that. are there any similar resources geared towards adults?

Try the International Dyslexia Association, they have branches all over: http://eida.org/ida-branches/

I've been told, and I've observed it myself, that about 60+% of dyslexics are males with IQs above 120. Having dyslexia lead to being labeled as retarded. It was because of my interests in model rocketry and teaching myself Calc and Trig and my parents not excepting the schools label I did better.

A lot of the students I schooled with in special Ed ended up in jobs or in jail. I'm a database administrator for a weather company.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com