As a child, I was a victim of a 'one size fits all' educational system. I never learned to read in school, but rather found 'work around' systems to camouflage my deficiencies & 'acted out' to take attention away from my inner suffering.
Similar to many young dyslexics, I suffered horrific trauma in school that started at the age of 5 when reading began to become the main focus of my school days.
I recall frequently being overcome with anxiety when being forced to read out loud in class. As each student took turns reading paragraphs out loud, fear would slowly begin to suffocate me as my turn became closer & closer. I would count the students & correlated paragraphs in order, to find which paragraph I would be doomed to read out loud. While the other students read their paragraphs one by one, I was unable to listen or retain any information from their readings because I was consumed with my necessary preparations which included silently reading & rereading to myself the paragraph I was soon to be required to read out loud.
The horror that would engulf me if by chance a student forgot their book or went to the restroom was unbearable, as the common result was their turn to read out loud forfeited & thus my strategic calculations to carefully predict the paragraph which would be forced upon me, were null in void.
While regularly bullied for my struggles with reading in grade school, I eventually taught myself to read, or at least the equivalent to reading & was able to read my first novel at 10 years old.
TODAY:
I have major PTSD from the ongoing trauma & daily hate thrown my way due to my deficiencies in reading as a child.
I enjoy reading, though prefer to listen to audio books via my Audible subscription.
With constant effort & practice, I have managed to decrease the amount of time it takes me to read simple passages significantly.
Although I can read quite effectively compared to most severely dyslexic individuals, I do not read the same way non-dyslexics read.
I do NOT read left to right.
I do NOT read from top to bottom.
I read from the inside out, my eyes wonder about the page grabbing words to formulate a constantly evolving image of the information I am gathering from the page.
While reading, it is not uncommon for me to bounce around the page, paragraph, or sentence, & rereading passages is still a frequent occurrence.
I do not retain specific details well.
I have found it beneficial to read or obtain the information I am required to know before reading the text; for example, in school reading the questions before the paragraphs.
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