Better
late than
never. The
story of the discovery of his dyslexia, by Alex Kocan. "In
May 2001, I was diagnosed as suffering from the learning difficulty, dyslexia,
at the age of 21. At this point I had been through sixteen years of full time
education. In retrospect it was clear that there was always something wrong with
my learning skills. Possibly they were not picked up on, as I didn’t cause a disturbance,
unlike other people at my school with learning difficulties. I just sat there
and tried my very best to get as much done as I possibly could until my books
were taken from me. The
first instance I recall of a problem was my first days at school, around the age
of five. I remember literally being shouted at by my teacher for writing the letters
'd' and 'b' backwards. They looked like they were reflected in a mirror. Apparently
my teacher thought that I wasn’t listening to her. After many hours of constant
repetition for weeks, according to my mum, I eventually learned the correct way
to write them.  My
reading was always poor for my age group. I was put into a parent helper group
for a while. Apart from that nothing else was done to help me. When my reading
got slightly better, at age six I was told I didn’t need to go any more. Even
at this age I saw fellow classmates reading books they were not told to. They
appeared to be enjoying reading. Reading for fun? Reading is fun? I have since
heard that some people did not enjoy reading. I honestly had no idea it was intended
to be fun. I was under the impression that I had been naughty and this was my
punishment. Reading made me feel sick, and still does. It scared me and I was
mentally exhausted afterwards.
Perhaps
the most upsetting experience for me was at the age of eight. My best friend told
me he was leaving school. When I asked him why, he told me that it was because
he couldn’t read very well. That did not make sense to me. I couldn’t read very
well either, could I? Over the next few years, two more people were removed from
my school for the same reason. I knew they found this problem by giving them a
test. As a result of this, every time we did a test I thought they were coming
to take me to the “special” school. This feeling stayed with me from that age
until about the age of fifteen. The only reason it stopped then was because I
thought “well, I'll be leaving next year anyway, so they won't throw me out now.
Will they?” Due
to the fear I had for reading, because I knew I wasn’t any good, I developed a
system to get out of reading aloud. This carried on until I was sixteen. At primary
school I used to cry and say I felt sick. At secondary school I used to do anything
to make myself be absent on the days I knew I would have to read. I used to lie
to my parents and say I felt ill. I used to drink weird and wonderful concoctions
from the spice cabinet to make me sick so I could stay off. The most sickening
one was a glass of milk id purposely hidden in my room two weeks previously, topped
up with a little Pepsi, some garlic sauce and an egg. Needless to say it did the
trick. For the majority
of the time I managed to avoid reading. However, in the eighth grade my work rapidly
improved. I used to be at the bottom of the class. Thankfully, at this point I
decided that I wanted to do well at school, as I wanted to be good at something.
I did my homework. I listened in class. I was always getting left behind in class.
I was always borrowing my best friend's exercise books to catch up. The classes
were marked from below average to above average. Every class except maths and
English rose from below average to above average in one semester and stayed there
for the next four years. I
also skipped up three maths sets from six to three. Set one being the “brightest”.In
every maths class I was the first to finish the exercises and I usually got 100%.
However, in the final exams I got a grade E, when my average had been grade C.
Hence, I failed. I felt stupid, angry and even more stupid. My
best grades were one A* for history, one A for media studies and the rest were
grade C. I was extremely proud of these grades and I was looking forward to my
educational future. My best grades were in the classes I really enjoyed and my
worst were in ones I hated. Having said this, my effort was always 100% for each
one. After the summer
of 1996 we began our Advanced levels qualifications, which would take up the next
two years. Over the first weekend of our two years we were set a history essay
question to complete. It was due on Monday and the results would be back on the
Tuesday. I was still feeling high from my A*. I thought maybe I would get a grade
B because it was a new class. The feeling I had when I saw I had scored a grade
E was devastating. I felt anger and was on the verge of crying. This
feeling of anger was directed against myself, not the teachers for giving me a
low grade. I felt I could have done more. However, that may have not been possible
as I worked from the moment I woke to the moment I went to bed every day for the
past five years. For
the next few months I continued to get grade E’s and a few D’s. When I went to
ask the teacher why this dramatic grade decrease had occurred all they said and
kept saying, was that I had to plan my work. So I did. After several hours of
planning and writing out essays over and over I was still told, “I need to plan
my essays”. The situation didn’t improve. My parents said I could drop out if
I wanted. I'm not a quitter and I stuck at it for two years. I went from an A+
student to an E grade student. My self-confidence dramatically decreased and I
had suffered long periods of depression. I hated myself, everyone and everything.
I applied for university as everyone else was doing so. I couldn’t care less about
education, at this stage, as they clearly didn’t care about me.
I applied to go to university the following year, but I ended up going several
months after the summer holidays of 1998. The
situation of maximum effort and no return continued into my university career.I
worked non-stop for two years. Every time an assignment was due my I felt excited.
I enjoyed writing it so I thought it was a good piece of work. Ninety per cent
of the time my heart dropped as I saw the big black D starring at me from the
bottom of the page. Very soon after Year Two finished I think I had a nervous
breakdown and completely lost the ability to think straight long enough to complete
an assignment. After
several months I decided to return to university and seek help from a councillor.
After telling her all about my struggle and frustration she suggested something
at first I laughed at. She said, “Have you ever thought about the possibility
that you might be dyslexic?” I pushed hard to find out one way or the other. First
of all, I went for a preliminary dyslexia test at my local adult education college.
The results of this test were that I was “at risk”. I think this meant I was borderline
yes and no. I then went back to university. They set up a full testing and they
paid for three quarters of the cost. This test result said that I am “severely”
dyslexic. This means that the difference between my verbal IQ and visual IQ is
dramatically significant. My IQ is 102, which is above average. They said if I
wasn’t dyslexic my IQ would perhaps be in the 120s.
When I finally returned to university I was equipped with three words that made
all the difference. They were:
“I am dyslexic”. Such
words cancel out previous thoughts of being dumb, slow or simply being stupid.
This boosted my confidence and my determination to try my very best returned.
I was now no longer scared of making mistakes. For reasons that still shock me
my average grades for the semester rocketed from a D- to a C+. I also got two
assignments at grade B and two grades of B+. I just hope that I can keep up this
level of work. It
is now seven months since I was diagnosed as being dyslexic. My emotions are so
mixed I'm not sure how I feel about the discovery. I feel angry for the education
system not discovering my problems. I am also angry with myself for not suggesting
it as a possibility. I have sort of known since the age of twelve, but I was always
told dyslexia meant not being able to read or spell in any form, and seeing as
I could, I didn’t want to be laughed at for suggesting it. Perhaps
the worst effects are the things I missed out on while growing up. I couldn’t
go out with my friends very often, I also lost friends, because I had to continue
with my homework. It usually took about four hours each night ;everyone else had
completed it within the hour. I feel my emotional and social development was affected
as a result. There
are also thoughts of, what if? What if they’d discovered it at the age of five?
If I can get two grade A’s with undiagnosed dyslexia, what could I have got if
I had help? I guess I'll never know for certain. Unfortunately,
I feel the damage caused, as a result of this, will never be completely resolved.
However, I can start rebuilding my confidence the best I can. If
there are any dyslexics that went through the same things as myself, I would love
to hear from you and talk about our similar experiences. Thank
you for letting me tell my story. Alexander
Kocan.
E-mail:
googoojoob24@hotmail.com Your
experiences. Please do e-mail
us your own experiences so that we can include them - anonymously if you wish
- on this page. A
social worker writes of her experiences with words.
Whoa!
Major Flashback.
Success
with the Direct Learning Reading Comprehension Exercise. | 
