Something has changed

[shadowgirl021]

I have been at my work place for nearly 9 months now which is an achievement and I feel lucky that I managed this long. I have amazing and supportive work Colleagues but recently something has changed.

6 Months ago, I told two of my work colleagues that I have Dyspraxia and they were fine about it, did not treat me differently at all. A month ago I start getting treated differently, it was subtle at first but this week it was/has been like I can not be trusted or I can not simply do certain things without it being passed over to someone else when I have been doing it fine for the past 8 and a half months!!!!

Plus with comments like you can not be expected to remember everything is an obvious realisation that the member's of staff all know. Of course that was actually a supportive comment coming from a nice member of staff, I am just upset that no-one (not one single person) has come up to me and said hey we know you have Dyspraxia, what is it, how does it affect you? Saying that though, a member of staff knows what it is because she knows someone who has it so no doubt she would have explained what it is.

[AlleyCat]

Plus with comments like you can not be expected to remember everything is an obvious realisation that the member's of staff all know.

Making that sort of comment is not helpful and, depending on the way it was said, could also cause you to feel patronised. Instead of saying things like that to you, staff should be seeing if there are things they can do to help you if remembering things really is a problem- for example, in some workplaces staff might have a whiteboard where they write down things that need doing.

I know what you mean about being treated as if you can't be trusted to do things because you have dyspraxia, as I was treated like this by my line manager, who was ironically the SENCO of the school I worked in and knew about me having dyspraxia when she employed me! Just because a member of staff knows that you have dyspraxia, it doesn't mean that she will have explained to the other members of staff what is is and how it affects you or explained to them how they can provide support. I was complained about by members of staff to my line manager for doing 'dyspraxic' things like speaking too loudly and interrupting, but instead of educating them about me having dyspraxia, she 'told me off' and expected me to just stop doing those things.

If you think that there is an ongoing pattern of being treated differently, you could keep a record of ways you have been treated and things which have been said to you. You could then arrange a meeting with your line manager to explain how it makes you feel to be treated like that- you could even suggest ways in which you think they could better support you.