Over the years I have come across dozens of dyslexic people who seem to have a real passion for reading and writing. For many, there appears to be a love affair going on between them and their books and/or story writing.
This can often shocks people who have little awareness of dyslexia as they assume that reading and writing would be the last things that someone with dyslexia would gain pleasure from doing. And yet, as mentioned, I have come across dozens of dyslexic people who seem to have a real passion for reading and writing.
Equally, over the years I have come across dozens, if not hundreds, of dyslexic people who seem to have a real hatred for reading and writing.
So, why is it that some dyslexic people love written language whilst others seem to really loath it?
Perhaps one of the reasons that many dyslexic people love to read and write might have something to do with the fact that reading and writing are brilliant inventions. For instance, reading can be a great way to stimulate our inner selves whilst writing can be an excellent way to help us express our thinking. So, once a dyslexic person gets to grips with using these inventions it is little wonder that they may fall in love with using them.
Unfortunately for some dyslexic people they find it hard to overcome the difficulties that they experience with written language and therefore never really get the hang of using it. For these people (and I was once one of them) nothing can be worst that the thought of having to do some reading and writing especially if their literacy skills do not match their level of intelligence. For example, it can be extremely frustrating trying to gain information from a book when your reading age is several years behind your own. And, it can be so humiliating when trying to write something in front of someone when your handwriting is completely unreadable.
Also, the thought of having to do some reading or writing might, for some dyslexic people, conjure up negative childhood memories. For example, they may have been picked on or made to feel inferior by their peers and/or teachers for having poor literacy skills. So, it’s no surprise then that for these people they may end up loathing reading and writing.
The question that we are now faced with is why are some dyslexic people able to overcome their difficulties and love reading and writing whilst others find dyslexia an insurmountable obstacle and end up hating reading and writing?
I hope to throw some light on this question within my PhD thesis. I am currently writing up my findings after spending the past 10 years researching the subject of dyslexia. I will be submitting my thesis to the University of Birmingham in July 2010 and as soon as I have I will publish several posts on the Dyslexic Brian website in order to share my theory of dyslexia and hopefully answer questions about dyslexia like the one mentioned above.