Can't work out IN MIND how to do something?

[cluttered]

One of the things making me doubt a professional would diagnose me with dyspraxia - and making me feel particularly bad at times - is that I can't actually visualise how, for example, a knot for a waste bag should be tied, or how a gift should be wrapped to look right. It's not just that I can't plan how my muscles should move; I can't even see how the objects at hand should be manipulated in theory. I have to learn this by much trial and error, or by being shown.

It sounds like poor visual-spatial reasoning, but I actually scored above average on the visual-spatial part of the IQ test I took as part of my ADHD assessment. It was significantly lower than my verbal score, suggesting there might be some more specific cognitive deficits that hold me back in that domain relative to how well I'd do at it otherwise, but it was a surprise as in daily life I was not made aware of any strengths whatsoever in visual-spatial reasoning (unless managing to conceptualise/intuit mathematical relationships for which most people rely on rote-learned formulae they don't understand counts, which I suppose it should).

Does anyone else have this pattern of problem? Is it what's called "ideational" dyspraxia, or is that something else? I can't find a clear enough explanation of ideational dyspraxia, so I'm not sure if it means what I've described, or instead a problem planning how and when to move the body's muscles when you do understand how the objects you're interacting with need to be manipulated.

[sanahasacat]

To me personally, this sounds like a kind of executive dysfunction, or something related to it- to be specific, a cognitive deficit in planning and sequencing - if it isn't visuo-spatial. Essentially like when you your flat is a total mess and you look around like "yes okay I need to clean but where do I start and how?". Ideational dyspraxia, as I understand it, is a subtype of this phenomenon specifically relating to the inability to conceptualize and plan movement. Which does sound similar to what you described, I think- but I have little first hand experience with it outside of my own brain, and am going on what I've read.

(Also remember, just because you scored high on visuo-spatial reasoning on a test doesn't mean you might not still have issues with it in other contexts; these things are complex. For example, I have severe short-term and working memory deficits in everyday life, yet kick ass at memory-based games.)

[cluttered]

I definitely do have problems with sequencing and planning in general, in a way that suggests some form of working memory problem; perhaps specifically a visual-spatial one, as the working memory part of the test, which was auditory, was also normal (but again lower than predicted by verbal score). However, isn't that sort of problem normal for people with ADHD? From my time on ADHD forums and knowing others with it in real life, I haven't found evidence that this level of trouble understanding simple physical alterations of the environment is common, even though most have poor working memory, planning and sequencing problems of some type, and I haven't even noticed it in those with worse fine motor co-ordination (e.g. worse handwriting) than I have. There seems to be something more going on in my case than difficulty holding information in mind long enough to plan a strategy... unless my planning problem is just particularly severe.