Neurological differences, stereotypes and enviroment issues.

Post Reply New Topic

To anyone who isn't neurotypical, and/or mentally healthy:
Have you ever ran into a stereotype about your difference/disorder?

Personally, I did. (skip the quote to skip my "sobby" story...)

what's DCD?

i didnt vote because i have a diagnosis of more than one of those

It's a motoric learning disability, last time I checked.

What are your diagnoses?

my psycologist says asperger's but my psychiatrist says PDD-nos, bipolar-nos anxiety disorder-nos and ADHD

Asperger's, Dyspraxia, OCD, Social Anxiety disorder, and Weird syndrome

I haven't really experienced any stereotyping I don't think

Aspergers (officially DXed, but current therapist thinks all I have is depression). Also have ADHD, Situational Depression, Social Anxiety/Phobia,

Asperger's.

New psychologists tend to diagnose people based on what they've seen from TV shows (that often feature sub-average or crude portrayals of any diagnoses), so a lot of mild, non-stereotypical case studies go undiagnosed. There are some people who say things similar to, "Oh, I don't rock myself back and forth and act like Rain Man, so I must not have Asperger's," or "Oh, but I'm not hyper all of the time, so I don't have ADD/ADHD," and it's mostly because of society's bigotry towards us.

Oh, and I either have Asperger's, NVLD (which, reviewing my fifth grade case report, seems to point evidence towards), or William's Syndrome, but I do have anxiety and panic attacks on occasion, but it's because of social anxiety.

My problem was, that no one knew ADD actually exists. They were sure thay ADD is just a little less hyperactive than ADHD.

Signature here.

Yes, dyspraxia.

Suspicion of "something else".


And many people in my family with learning disorders.

Facing any stereotypes?
(The high-on-sugar/randomly-screaming-unverbal/math-obsessed nerd, for example?)



Any stereotype?

Facing any stereotypes?
(The high-on-sugar/randomly-screaming-unverbal/math-obsessed nerd, for example?)[quote].

I'm active in one area, but not in another and it's not because of sugar. I have a low voice so I don't scream that much. I am good at math but I don't obsess over it. I was never looked at as a nerd because I don't look like one. The only stereotype I ever got was being called or looked at as weird, but that's rare.

I think the only diagnosed neurological disorder I have is Asperger's. All the rest are in the realm of emotional disturbances. I'm probably going to bet having autism includes an array of processing and learning disorders that just all get attributed to the autism and thus aren't singled out enough to be diagnosed.

I do not know if there is any stereotypes about dyspraxia.

In my family, most people tend to be the complete opposite of what is expected from them.

Such as : my dyslexic grandmother (maternal) became the best reader of her school and she is still a fast reader and makes no mistakes in her spelling (she taught herself a way to fight the disorder).

My other dyslexic grandmother have learned English when she was a child (I've heard dyslexic people saying that foreign languages were hard for them, especially English because it was not like French at all) and she is very good at crosswords.

My gifted father has failed in his studies, never uses his math skills and is a manual worker.

My dyspraxic uncle was a waiter when he was young and did well, he can cook pretty fast, do sports almost perfectly and can find a new place easily (he was helped when he was a child and it worked though he was severely dyspraxic at first).

I have almost no math skills but I am very good at divisions and sudoku (I see very fast which number is missing ) so that's very far from what I've been told by my teachers. I lack of spatial skills but can draw a 120° angle perfectly without any measuring tool (did it three times at school when I was still unable to know the difference between parallel and perpendicular).
I consider myself close to HFA or Asperger but I am nowhere near the math nerd, I am more of a language nerd really. I am not interested in learning what pi is (apart from 3,14) though I did when I first learned about his number, I cannot count how many steps there are in my house in 3 seconds and I am now working with children and doing it well (I even succeeded in faking a small smile without looking scary ).
By the way, I am totally messy except for things I collect and my computer files.


My dyslexic cousin used to be a stereotype of dyslexic/ADHD child.

She was hyperactive all the time, almost always screaming (even at 12) but it stopped when she started to do sports, she cannot read or write properly and fails at school, she feels miserable for that. So, I guess there is one stereotype in my family.

Last edited by lostD on 10 Oct 2010, 11:57 am, edited 1 time in total.

1. Awesome.

2. Ow, reminds me of a guy in my class: He's a genius of IQ, but has no motivation.

3. Lool, me too.

4. My sister is Dysgraphic and ADHD. She has a better handwriting than me, but still fits the second stereotype. X_X