Something eye catching and original
Posted: Thu Mar 02, 2017 8:25 am
Hi all,
So I had an Ed Psych assessment this week, and although the report won't be back for a while, she seemed pretty convinced I'm dyspraxic. I'd had my suspicions, but didn't (and don't) know a huge amount about the condition other than the clumsiness thing (which is me all over). My Ed Psych was dyspraxic herself, so was able to fill me in on her own subjective experience a bit - she described it as the "doctor who" condition - because dyspraxia can make you feel "lost in time and space", which I quite liked.
I'd booked the assessment because my own suspicion was that I might have ADHD(PI) - I still think that I might, and I'm sure I've read that the two things are not infrequently comorbid. I'll have to wait for the report to see what the psych thought in detail. The bulk of the assessment seemed to be psychometric (mostly the WAIS), without a huge amount of history taking, but it did show a huge discrepancy between processing time and working memory compared to verbal IQ, and a smaller but still significant discrepancy between verbal IQ and performance IQ. I'm skeptical about using IQ tests for diagnosis, but I have to admit that differences like that between domains must indicate something. I've been referred for an ADHD assessment through the NHS as well, but adult waiting times in my area are in the months to years.
Anyway, this is my introducing myself thing. I'm 32, a second year medical student on a four year course. I struggle with organisation, procrastination, forgetting things, daydreaming, and becoming bored/distracted easily - and I've always put all this down to personal failings on my part. But since I've been trying without much success to improve on these things for my entire life, I started wondering if there was something going on other than pure laziness. Thing is, despite what some people in my life have told me, I know somewhere deep down that I'm not lazy. I try really hard, I honestly do. In the past, at the same time that some people have been telling me how unmotivated and lazy I am, others have told me how hard I work and how they were impressed that I didn't give up. (I don't think I'm particularly good in that way myself, but I am stubborn).
I also am, and have always been, infamously clumsy. I walk and run funny (although still managed to join the army and pass the training, despite comments on my funny marching - they usually just hid me in the middle of the platoon during parades... I struggled to run fast enough for the fitness tests, but I made it through.) I drop things. I walk into things. I never learned to tie my shoelaces properly (but I learned a trick - making two loops and tying them in a normal knot does the same thing as the fancy rabbit and holes thing that normal people do). I took forever and a lot of patience on behalf of my long-suffering driving instructor to learn to drive, and I have to force myself to take it easy on the roads (despite a love of going fast) because I know I'm still not a great driver.
I can though, with practice, perform examinations and procedures on patients without hurting anybody. What I'm really struggling with at the moment is organising myself to learn the huge amount of information med school demands - I'm good at the working stuff out bit, terrible at the rote-learning bit (and in anatomy in particular, that's a big bit). I've joined here to try to learn how other people find ways around their own struggles, in the hope that I can improve on the things I struggle with. That and the whole mutual support thing.
So I had an Ed Psych assessment this week, and although the report won't be back for a while, she seemed pretty convinced I'm dyspraxic. I'd had my suspicions, but didn't (and don't) know a huge amount about the condition other than the clumsiness thing (which is me all over). My Ed Psych was dyspraxic herself, so was able to fill me in on her own subjective experience a bit - she described it as the "doctor who" condition - because dyspraxia can make you feel "lost in time and space", which I quite liked.
I'd booked the assessment because my own suspicion was that I might have ADHD(PI) - I still think that I might, and I'm sure I've read that the two things are not infrequently comorbid. I'll have to wait for the report to see what the psych thought in detail. The bulk of the assessment seemed to be psychometric (mostly the WAIS), without a huge amount of history taking, but it did show a huge discrepancy between processing time and working memory compared to verbal IQ, and a smaller but still significant discrepancy between verbal IQ and performance IQ. I'm skeptical about using IQ tests for diagnosis, but I have to admit that differences like that between domains must indicate something. I've been referred for an ADHD assessment through the NHS as well, but adult waiting times in my area are in the months to years.
Anyway, this is my introducing myself thing. I'm 32, a second year medical student on a four year course. I struggle with organisation, procrastination, forgetting things, daydreaming, and becoming bored/distracted easily - and I've always put all this down to personal failings on my part. But since I've been trying without much success to improve on these things for my entire life, I started wondering if there was something going on other than pure laziness. Thing is, despite what some people in my life have told me, I know somewhere deep down that I'm not lazy. I try really hard, I honestly do. In the past, at the same time that some people have been telling me how unmotivated and lazy I am, others have told me how hard I work and how they were impressed that I didn't give up. (I don't think I'm particularly good in that way myself, but I am stubborn).
I also am, and have always been, infamously clumsy. I walk and run funny (although still managed to join the army and pass the training, despite comments on my funny marching - they usually just hid me in the middle of the platoon during parades... I struggled to run fast enough for the fitness tests, but I made it through.) I drop things. I walk into things. I never learned to tie my shoelaces properly (but I learned a trick - making two loops and tying them in a normal knot does the same thing as the fancy rabbit and holes thing that normal people do). I took forever and a lot of patience on behalf of my long-suffering driving instructor to learn to drive, and I have to force myself to take it easy on the roads (despite a love of going fast) because I know I'm still not a great driver.
I can though, with practice, perform examinations and procedures on patients without hurting anybody. What I'm really struggling with at the moment is organising myself to learn the huge amount of information med school demands - I'm good at the working stuff out bit, terrible at the rote-learning bit (and in anatomy in particular, that's a big bit). I've joined here to try to learn how other people find ways around their own struggles, in the hope that I can improve on the things I struggle with. That and the whole mutual support thing.