is it an LD or just stupidity?

Intelligence is broken down into many catagories. My verbal comprehension and verbal abstract problem solving are in the 98th and 99th percentile respectively but my overall performance IQ is 65. My overall prorated IQ is 131. So when it comes to grasping concepts and seeing the gestalt of a situation I am about 100 points higher than George W. Bush and most other politicians.

My areas of impairment involve visual processing and visual memory. Also my processing speed is in the 3rd percentile. Usually “dullards” have no areas of strength. I don;t mean that a projorative way. In fact the simplicity of some of the mentally retarded make them quite profound.

No matter how one defines intelligence it should not be used to determine a person’s value the way it currently is. I think retards are put here to teach us compassion. Sometime I think as a society we are very slow learners.

We westernized humans are a shallow bunch.

well i’m glad i was put here for a reason :(

A person,

Your post is certainly intelligent enough! Interesting question, clearly written with very reasonable spelling and good sentaince structure. You finished high school and took some college classes.

That doesn’t sound like a dummy to me!

I can hear the pain in your post and I wish there was something I could tell you other than many people score lower on standardized IQ tests then thier “real” intelligence level. Its just a number, try not to trip on it.

So you are out of school. How is work going? How is life in general?

Barb

I’m not a near genius in anything like many lders, I’m basically low average all across the board according to the series of tests that I took.

Life kind sucks right at the moment to tell you the truth.

As other people said, you don’t write like a person who is really slow. That is probably part of why you are hurting, that you do have abilities but you aren’t getting to use them. Have you tried working one-to-one with a tutor and getting your basic academic skills built up? If you can’t pay a tutor, there are various community and church organizations where you can find retired teachers and engineers etc. It is worth a search and a try — better than sitting and stewing.

[quote:66fffa62fc=”victoria”]As other people said, you don’t write like a person who is really slow. That is probably part of why you are hurting, that you do have abilities but you aren’t getting to use them. Have you tried working one-to-one with a tutor and getting your basic academic skills built up? If you can’t pay a tutor, there are various community and church organizations where you can find retired teachers and engineers etc. It is worth a search and a try — better than sitting and stewing.[/quote]

Thank you Victoria, that was compassionate, insightful and informative.

In my mind however; is all boils down to improving the LDer’s brain function. Some of the techniques Victoria has described in other posts are tried and true methods for doing just that. Perhaps Victoria can elaborate on some ways for you to improve your acedemic skills.

IQ scores can be a bit deceptive because the are comprised of several series of tests and subtests. Perhaps if your test was prorated and the impaired tests thrown out it would be much higher. In the case of an LDer the significance of a standard IQ test should be looked at with a more critical eye.

A person,

Your post struck me with immediate melancholy: I have recently been contemplating my supposed LD and whether I may simply have a disappointing degree of cognitive ability. I have been consulting an LD coach but I cannot seem to accept a perception of myself without factoring in a heavy dose of “I’m really a dimwit” along with it. As a result my life is on hold, career plans etc. The thought of looking at my childish handwriting, struggling with spelling and trying to reed through a sentence worth of text while my mind interrupts me time after time really frustrates me. The other night I started to look for my bachelors degree in order to rip it up: I certainly must be a discredit to the institutions that erroneously awarded it to me. You are not alone in your concerns. G

Hi Greg,
Maybe you’re just ‘seeing the glass as half empty, rather than half full’?
Perhaps you might shift your focus to your strengths?
Afterall, their are not many All round Mental Athletes?
Geoff.

As I reflect back on my 20 some odd years of existence I find myself constantly evaluating mistakes that I’ve made that have hindered my opportunity to get basic fundamental principles of education that are essential for a person to be functional in society.

I like most everyone was given 13 years of opportunity, each year of academic advancement I increasingly got more and more frustrated with my studies and ended neglecting most of them.

I have a problem processing information when I receive instruction. My LD (if it is an LD) doesn’t have a specific name to it, the “axis” or diagnosis of my LD has never been specified in any of the diagnostic tests that I’ve taken.

After researching what percentile my iq falls under on the Internet, and reading statistics, the likelihood of myself entering the profession that I’m interested in may never happen. But for some reason I havn’t given up all hope in life, I seem to for some reason function better when I’m thinking independently. Anxiety and fear has crippled me for to many years, where am I going to go if I let others opinions enslave me for the rest of my life? what good is it going to do me if i beat myself up over past mistakes, it’s hard to get beyond these things sometimes…

In real life others have told me that I have the gift of “compassion” that my demeanor and my personality would suit me in career where helping others is a daily priority. Sometimes this does makes sense, because I seem to be more happy when helping people rather than focusing on my own problems.

My mother has said that the things I’m going though are normal for a lot people and I need just face these life’s difficulties on my own rather than constantly relying on her and others to prop me up.

I’m starting to believe she’s right.

A person

When I reread my last post in this thread, I found it a bit on the depressing side: I didn’t mean to worsen your frustration but to empathize. I find it interesting that I also have had people tell me I have “compassion” and I should focus on that strength. I am not sure what that means. Anyway, for some reason, even though I become frustrated and stressed to the point of kicking the dog, I feel optimistic that I can compensate for my supposed LD problems. Go figure. My biggest hurdle is accepting things as they are. You’re last post indicates to me that that’s a hard one for you as well.

Hi Geoff. Thanks for your comments. I really need to vent my frustration some times and I jumped at the opportunity. I guess it is not the realization that I’m not a mental giant, but rather how far left on the bell curve I fall.

Greg

Diagnostically speaking, the sentence structure speaks of high cognitive ability. Several ideas are organized and interwoven into coherent, but complex sentences.
Okay, there may be some light bulbs in the mental marquee that are dim. It is worth doing serious mental/emotional training to keep that from letting the other ones shine.
YOu might want to find a copy of “Exceeding Expectations” by Reiff, Gerber & Ginsberg. (Pro-Ed carries it; don’t know if it would take a University library to have it… but hey, here in Illinois your library card gets you access to the U. libraries, too, tho’ they don’t exactly broadcast that.) These guys went and researched “high achieving” (rigorously defined, not just somebody’s testimony) “learning disabled” (again, rigorously defined, not “well, I think I might have had some of that dyslexia”) people to determine patterns in their skills & behaviors & personal habits.
People *can* shift mindsets, including “I’m a dimwit,” starting with trying to set yourself up in a situation where people at least occasionally recognize your strenghts. (A hint: deciding to just be merciless with yourself and those flaws in order to try & correct them can just make things infinitely worse… )

[quote]Diagnostically speaking, the sentence structure speaks of high cognitive ability. Several ideas are organized and interwoven into coherent, but complex sentences.
Okay, there may be some light bulbs in the mental marquee that are dim. It is worth doing serious mental/emotional training to keep that from letting the other ones shine.
YOu might want to find a copy of “Exceeding Expectations” by Reiff, Gerber & Ginsberg. (Pro-Ed carries it; don’t know if it would take a University library to have it… but hey, here in Illinois your library card gets you access to the U. libraries, too, tho’ they don’t exactly broadcast that.) These guys went and researched “high achieving” (rigorously defined, not just somebody’s testimony) “learning disabled” (again, rigorously defined, not “well, I think I might have had some of that dyslexia”) people to determine patterns in their skills & behaviors & personal habits.
People *can* shift mindsets, including “I’m a dimwit,” starting with trying to set yourself up in a situation where people at least occasionally recognize your strenghts. (A hint: deciding to just be merciless with yourself and those flaws in order to try & correct them can just make things infinitely worse… )
[/quote]

Sue are you addressing Greg or myself?

<< YOu might want to find a copy of “Exceeding Expectations” by Reiff, Gerber & Ginsberg. (Pro-Ed carries it; don’t know if it would take a University library to have it… but hey, here in Illinois your library card gets you access to the U. libraries, too, tho’ they don’t exactly broadcast that.) These guys went and researched “high achieving” (rigorously defined, not just somebody’s testimony) “learning disabled” (again, rigorously defined, not “well, I think I might have had some of that dyslexia”) people to determine patterns in their skills & behaviors & personal habits. >>

Hi Sue,

Not to be a naysayer since I greatly enjoy reading your posts but I found that book very frustrating for several reasons. First of all, it seems that most of those folks had Dyslexia with only one person possibly having NLD. I know that people with Dyslexia do not have it easy at all but NLD affects so many more life areas. As a result, it is harder to find a career that takes advantage of our strengths.

By the way, I don’t mean to do a a “my disability is worse than yours” routine. But I still feel it is important to state exactly what their LDs were since I feel that is relevant information.

I also felt the book had the “If these people can do it, so can you” message. I have never liked people doing that to me and I certainly try to make sure I don’t do it either.

Still, I tried very hard to keep an open mind as perhaps I really could learn something. But it just seems the book kept discussing generalities and never really provided specifics on what I could do as an adult to undergo some of the processes that these folks did when they were younger. I vaguely remember discussion about teaching all of this in high school but that angered me greatly. I felt once again, that adults with LD who weren’t succeeding and needed help were getting the shaft.

Finally, this book reminded me of what seems to take place in this society. If we don’t know how to help folks and that still seems to be the case with LD adults although I admit it is changing somewhat, we put the blame on them and say they have a bad attitude.

Anyway, I really don’t mean to be so negative. But this book just rubbed me the wrong way.

PT

Interesting points and good ones. I don’t think they were trying to send any message about “we don’t know how to help you so you fix it” though. It was pretty cut and dried research to answer the questions.
But yea, I do know what you mean about the “they can do it, so you can too!” Especially when it’s supposed to happen by magic, because, you know, these people with LD are smart in ways we just don’t understand.
And that’s why we aren’t going to give them any special services. They are smart, they will get by — hey, Einstein did!
(And what about the thousands of people who didn’t have the right inward and outer ingredients to become physicists? But… I’m preaching to the converted here…)
I do find the book very useful for people who want to know more — but will realize that there’s got to be more to the picture than attitude.

I noticed the same thing when I was tested with an IQ test for LD several years after being tested in school for IQ and academic reasons. When I was nine I scored at an 145-150 IQ range in an IQ test give in school. The school IQ test was academics as well as visual, spelling, and language testing. Well when I went to get tested for LD in college two years ago I was disappointed that my score on the IQ test was only 125-130 in an “average” range and I wondered why I had gotten so “dumb” over the years. I was told by the LD specialist it could have been because I didn’t get my LD diagnosed early enough to be able to not get behind in academics, or I had LDs all of my life (but they were rather mild) until I developed an eating disorder as a teenager and I further damaged my brain.

[quo noticed the same thing when I was tested with an IQ test for LD several years after being tested in school for IQ and academic reasons. When I was nine I scored at an 145-150 IQ range in an IQ test give in school. The school IQ test was academics as well as visual, spelling, and language testing. Well when I went to get tested for LD in college two years ago I was disappointed that my score on the IQ test was only 125-130 in an “average” range and I wondered why I had gotten so “dumb” over the years. I was told by the LD specialist it could have been because I didn’t get my LD diagnosed early enough to be able to not get behind in academics, or I had LDs all of my life (but they were rather mild) until I developed an eating disorder as a teenager and I further damaged my brain.te]

Oh that’s such a horrible number 125, I would really be hung if it dropped that much :roll:

Umm Amber from my understanding of IQ tests, the scores when you’re a child are higher then when you become an adult, when you test as an adult they tend to drop

That number is very bright and you have nothing to be ashamed of, except for the fact that you made me feel like more of a moron.

Sorry. I don’t mean to make anyone feel that way. Actually I was told I had CAPD and processing speed disorder ( which I still don’t understand what the heck that is) and if my IQ was actually lower than 100 than my auditory part of the test would have been an above average score. Strange isn’t it?

Anyway I’ve been told that if LD is not found at an early age the IQ drops from years of neglect of the LD as you get further behind. I think I only kept my scores up as I was homeschooled from seventh to twefth grade and pushed myself to bring my math scores up to a six grade level. If I had stayed in public school I would have got further behind, and if my LD was diagnosed then I would have been held back in school probably in a class with kids who were mentally disabled and/or brain injured or kids who maybe were there because they didn’t want to learn so got a LD diagnosis. Believe me I was told by a classmate with LD about her experience in special ed in public school in the eighties era where they put LD kids with mentally handicapped kids or juvenile deliquents so I was glad homeschooling was an option for me.

Amber CAPD is “Central Auditroy Processing Disorder”

Difintion of Auditory - “Having to do with hearing or the organs of hearing”.

The test that diagnosticions use to identify CAPD is called SCAN-A, the test collects information about an individuals ability to process auditory stimuli.

SCAN-A has four subsets of tests which are - Filtered Words, Auditory Figure Ground, Competing Words, Competing Sentences.

If I remember correctly when you and I were given that test we wearing headphones and were required to verbally repeat to the diagnostician what was being repeadted to us via the recording.

each of those subsets have a measured score, if you score less than 7 that’s considered to be severe auditory impairment. when you calculate all of those scores together and come up with a number less then 85 you have CAPD.

Auditory processing skill are crucial for your success in lecture situations where you have to interpret instructional material that’s being presented to you.

If CAPD then you have a hard time hearing and interpreting the information that your teachers/college instructors are giving to you.

I’m sure there are accomadations that help you get over this deficit, that and a bright IQ of 125 won’t stop you from doing whatever you want to do.

I’m sure there are other tests that are given to indentify CAPD but that’s the one that was given to me.

I hope I’m partially right by giving you my understanding of it.

I was tested differently but it was the same type of thing as the specialist wanted to see my hearing acuity. She told me to repeat a sequence of letters and numbers, and she told me to reverse them in different ways such as putting the letters first in alphabetical order or putting the numbers in order before the letters after she repeated them. Doing tests with earphones she said is usually only helpful for finding deafness as it would block out all background noise which interferes with a CAPD person’s ability to concentrate on what is being said. She also did a two hour long questionarre a week before the IQ test of questions about the health and lifestyle I had as a child and a teenager. A lot of factors in that test showed that I was at risk for LD ( let me see: prematurity, ADD being two factors of mine) so she ordered the IQ test. As she said this is the way students are tested for LD here in California schools.