Do I even have a LD?

There is probably a scam going on but that does not mean that you don’t have some impairment.

Get tested by a someone with no vested interest.

I was not diagnosed as having discalcula ( which I thought I had because I’m a bit slow in math) but a processing speed disorder as well as CAPD. The lady who tested me said with discalcula I would have been hardly able to do third grade math and I had been at a Pre-Algebra level then. She said I was only slow in math from the processing speed disorder and with intensive tutoring and untimed tests I could do well.

And I understand that people who have or are recovering from drug addiction have protection from the American With Disabilties Act. Since drugs can cause brain damage my recovering addict classmate is protected by those laws. Now I don’t know about my classmates who don’t understand English very well. I’m thinking maybe they have disabilties but are not open with them as the guy who was recovering from drug addiction was.

[quote=”Amber”]I was not diagnosed as having discalcula ( which I thought I had because I’m a bit slow in math) but a processing speed disorder as well as CAPD. The lady who tested me said with discalcula I would have been hardly able to do third grade math and I had been at a Pre-Algebra level then. She said I was only slow in math from the processing speed disorder and with intensive tutoring and untimed tests I could do well.

And I understand that people who have or are recovering from drug addiction have protection from the American With Disabilties Act. Since drugs can cause brain damage my recovering addict classmate is protected by those laws. Now I don’t know about my classmates who don’t understand English very well. I’m thinking maybe they have disabilties but are not open with them as the guy who was recovering from drug addiction was.[/quote

I never ceases to amaze me that drug addict get ADA status SSI and all sorts of perk while wh get the shaft

Amber you know your self better than the third rate dx/lable you got so trust your own judgement where your impairments are concerned.

Maybe you can convince people you are a druggie. That way you can scam the scammers.

nope, doesn’t sound like discalculia is the problem — and IMHO it usually isn’t. THere are a whole lot of reasons to have trouble in math — it’s a complicated subject.

Now, about the “getting the diagnosis right.” As far as the school folks go, they’re not really concerned with a precise diagnosis. For most of them/us, it’s “okay, how can we get people educated?” If certain kinds of help will let you learn the stuff, then the label doesn’t matter much.
Then there’s that funky grey area — are you learning less because of the help and taking the tests in the disability center? It’s a valid question. I know some of our folks just want to make requirements, and learning is beside the point — and that makes it wicked hard for the folks further down the line who have to deal with a student in their class without the skills to succeed (and precisely which skills is another interesting question — sometimes it’s a basic reading, writing or math skill, sometimes it really is a skill that goes along with a prerequisite course, and sometimes it’s thsoe lovely skills of reliability and punctuality).
Math courses have been a “rite of passage” in many programs — you don’t necessarily need the math skills, but you do need to be smart enough to learn those skills to tackle the stuff later on. Same with some of the reading and English courses. It’s tough working with students who are really putting in a lot of time and effort — but also, really, have no earthly idea what they’ve just read. .. and don’t even know what it *is* to have an earthly idea, so they just don’t understand why what they’re writing down is being considered “wrong.”
Do you feel like you could do algebra you couldn’t do before?

Most folks - including a lot of folks who work with folks with disabilities — don’t really comprehend LD’s well enough to say intelligent things about somebody with a 140 IQ and an LD. It’s a label to get services to them.
OFten it’s a case of being sure to keep all your documentation in order, and if there’s mroe testing (but it’s very possible you won’t have to do that) then you want to make sure the testing focuses on processing, not your academic skills & knowledge. If it has to be updated, then if you can get the same person to do it again that’s what I would do — schools generally *don’t* insist on doing their own testing. They just want good paperwork for the legalities.
The style & quality of teaching in math is ****extremely**** underrated. People assume that If You Have The Ability (and are of the chosen few), then You Can LEarn It. And of course, the people that teach it are often the people who like it because it came naturally to them — they don’t know how to *teach* it to people who have to figure it out. But there really are ways to teach it (I spend many of my waking hours every day doing it) to people who struggle with it.
As far as “self-esteem” goes — personal expectations of success *do* have an awful lot to do with whether people succeed in math or not. No, not success… expectations of understanding. My students who assume that they aren’t *really* going to “get it” have a fundamentally different approach to math than the ones who want to understand what they’re doing. One lady in particular did her homework by looking up the answers in teh back, and then finding some combination of operations that would yield that answer. It would be a different kind of operation for each problem — she didn’t think it shoudl actually make sense. When she changed her approach to looking a t a problem and asking “what do I have to do — and how can I do that?” she started making progress.
The psychology of learning math is fascinating — self-esteem also ties in when the “light bulb” goes on. When *I* struggled with a concept and got frustrated and tense… and then finally got it, I smugly rejoiced. I had won. I was, of course, brilliant for having made sense of this.
I keep watching students make that nifty cognitive leap — and be crushed. “How could I be so stupid not to have seen this??? If it tooke me that long to get something this simple, I’ll never be able to pass!”
Aargh! It only seems simple **NOW** because you’ve changed your whole comprehension and are a more advanced thinker.
Okay, can ya tell it’s a slow day ??? THey’ve finally arrived to switch mny computer…

What the college did was give me an I.Q. test along with an academic test. The woman who tested me could see something was wrong as she did the auditory part of the test. That showed I had CAPD then they did some tests in other areas. I was a bit slow in doing some things ( such as math) but I got near genius scores in vocabulary and reading skills.

Anyway I’ve known there was something wrong with me since I was eleven. When the special ed kids ( most were younger than me) in the classroom right next to yours can remember their times tables and repeat them quickly as you struggle with your tables from six through twelve then there is something wrong. Then people were asking my mother if I were deaf, audistic, “slow” or mentally handicapped as I got older I knew I needed to get help. A neighbor’s mother asked me three years ago if I were “retarded” and I just wanted to cry as I knew there was something different that people saw in me that my family thought was just “quirky”. For a long time I didn’t seek help because I was too ashamed and scared to find out what was the matter with me.

Gookie Dawkins:

It is unfortunate that these people choose to attack this website.
But you have to understand that a large number of these pseudonyms and “guests” are not real people at all. Often the internet troll makes up a new pseudonym and starts a discussion or an argument with himself to make the thread appear to be alive. Then a well-meaning person like yourself comes in and gets caught in the crossfire. These people spend their whole lives finding the most hurtful things possible to say, and say them with the protection of computer anonymity so they will not get the appropriate response that they would receive in person.
Since you cannot give the appropriate responses in person, the only thing to do is to walk away from it and let them stew in their own foul juices. Don’t bother to answer these posts, because you’re just encouraging them to find more ways to say something hurtful to you and others.
If you really feel something should not be on the board at all, report it to the LDOnline moderators.

To our readers,

We were alerted to this thread by one of our members. After reviewing this thread, we decided to limit the posts to those that discuss the topic originally introduced.

Learning disabilities and ADHD can be very emotional subjects, and it is understandable that our users will respond passionately to each other — particularly when the welfare of children is at stake. We appreciate that spirited discussions will take place. However, if an issue arises where we hear that any user does not feel they are being treated with respect and care, we will take the time to investigate and make a judgment on posts.

We have a really great community here, and we appreciate that we rarely need to set limits on posts. Let’s keep our positive spirit of community, support, and exchange of information going.

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LD OnLine Staff

I don’t get some people. No compassion.

Hey I’m just going to take my LD and go for it! What the heck? I mean there’s the runners with the artificial legs and once I read of a girl with cystic fibrosis ( a lung and digestive system disease) climbing a mountain. If they can overcome their “handicaps” I can too! I’m thinking of actually transferring to a university this year after I get a good paying job. Hey if a one legged man and a lady with CF can climb a mountain than I can surely get a bachelor’s degree!

Amber — good luck to you.

Remember there will be up days and down days. On the down days, remember they don’t last forever and better times do come, especially if you keep working for them.

One thing I see often in college is students who think that just going and having a good attitude is enough. No. Learning means change. Change is never easy. When an instructor asks you to do something that you don’t know how to do, well, that is what you are there for, isn’t it? If the demands are within the curriculum of the course (and take note, yes there are a *few* instructors who are off-the-wall and demand things that are not appropriate) well, it’s your business as a student to figure out how to get that curriculum — that’s what you are paying for, to have your mind stretched. Read, study, ask questions in and out of class, and make use of tutoring centers and all that.