Good afternoon,
Thanks again for reading my blog. I posted a new blog the other day based on an experience I had on the phone earlier this week. About how I don’t often “do” phone calls because of what goes on in my mind; namely the struggles with organising my thoughts and my speech.
I posted the blog to a group and as I hoped, I got some feedback on it. This led to another discussion about my use of language with regard to “suffering with” Dyspraxia. I got a bit of a telling-off about using language that is disempowering for people who have Dyspraxia.
But I didn’t use that in my blog. It’s on my main website and this is what it says at the time of writing…
“I believe in being honest with customers about myself and my abilities to perform the service you want me to give you. So I want to talk to you about Dyspraxia. It is a little known neurological condition that affects “sufferers in a different way“
I can see how “sufferers” in this context can have negative connotations. And I know how people who have Dyspraxia experience the condition in different ways. There’s no one person who thinks of it the same way.
So I accept that feedback is important. But I want to explain why I used the word in that way.
In truth I’d forgotten I’d written it and didn’t really think much of it at the time. But I did it because of my own experiences. Some people when they have Dyspraxia they have the symptoms in a bad way. Some show worse symptoms than others I have it mild in terms of the coordination and physical side of things. But when it comes to the organisation of my thought and speech, I have it bad. I feel like I “suffer” for it. And I don’t mean that in terms of physical suffering, but it can be a mental hardship because it affects so much of the way I think and go about my life.
I only wish I had not generalised as much as I did.
In doing so it ignited criticism on me because not everyone feels like they do “suffer” from it. Of course they don’t. I didn’t mean to use it as anything more than another way than a way of saying “those who have Dyspraxia” but I was driven by my own experiences.
So let me try and correct the record.
When I use the term “suffer”, the last thing I want to do is imply that people with Dyspraxia are not capable of the same things as Neurotypical people. I don’t mean to be so unrelentingly negative about Dyspraxic attributes and the last thing I want to do is disempower people. Dyspraxic people should all be proud of their achievements and I’d never say anything against that.
Each and every one of us is unique, whether or not we are neurodiverse so we all have our strengths and weaknesses. We should all be inspired to overcome our difficulties in the ways that work for us.
It’s just that in my experience, sometimes I do feel like I suffer and if I had the chance to take my difficulties away, I would find it hard not to take that chance because sometimes I get sick of it.
There are certain things neurotypical people can do as well as neurodiverse people, that will forever remain a mystery to me. For example, people who go into public service such as government etc…. how do they do that? People, who go into creative and technical industries: How do they do that? I watch Antiques Roadshow on a Sunday evening (I’m getting old) and I wonder… how do these people fit all that information into their brains, recall it and orate about it when I can barely remember what I did yesterday?
As for me, the best thing I can say about my mind is it is unique and I have to do things in a unique way to get by. So yes, I do feel like in a world that is made for neurotypical people first and foremost I do “suffer”. So that might slip out again in the future. But if I do that with you, and you don’t appreciate being described as such, do let me know and I will moderate my language accordingly.
Thank you as always for reading.