Hello, not sure that I have dyspraxia

[GenerallyFading]

Hello all

I've always been a clumsy person. As far I know, my childhood was pretty normal, I don't think that I failed to meet my milestones but it can't said that I excelled at sports at school (I hated all of them) and I was also very strong (I'm built like a bloke rather than a woman). I always felt as though I was just an enormous person who couldn't appreciate how large they were. In puberty, I ballooned and went through years of not only being huge but also being unwilling to do anything 'sporty' due to a lack of co ordination. My father was intensly ashamed of me because of my inability to follow instructions, to move gracefully, to do tasks with speed and finesse and I wonder if there is any argument that given enough pressure, one can learn to overcome dyspraxia, if one doesn't have it severely? I appreciate that there are people on this forum who struggle with this and I am not suggesting that it doesn't exist or anything like that. I am saying that in my case, I simply learned to concentrate on every movement I make, which is what I do every day. Anything I intend to do, I focus on, from walking across the room, to picking things up, to carrying cups and so on. It's like if I stop concentrating or try to do something spontaneously, that's when I drop things or knock things over. Just recently, I tried to brush a fly away from my face and managed to knock my £600 pair of glasses onto the floor. I then tried to brush a hair away from my forehead and knocked my glasses again. These stupid things I do, where I risk damaging expensive things, just because I don't seem to know where my limbs are in relation to my body. And yet, I have learnt to drive, I used to do Caligraphy and art and I play video games. I just don't understand why I can do some things and others seem to be beyond me - picking things off the floor is a nightmare as the object is always 2 centimetres further than I reach for. I have difficulty with speaking when I am stressed, I sometimes suffer 'brain freeze' (like if I am in an interview). However I can multitask. I am unware of where my feet are, so if I walk across a room and there's something on the floor, I generally fall over it. I step on things easily. If I'm not 'watching' my feet, it takes a while to register I'm stepping on something.

I just don't know if this is dyspraxia or what, but I can't seem to find anyone who goes through what I go through and Googling "I have to concentrate on moving or I bump into things" brings up Dyspraxia. I feel like my brain is on "concentrate mode" all day just to behave normally. Can anyone help? I seem to have had this all my life, but sometimes it feels as though it's getting worse and I'd just like an answer as to why I do stupid things because my limbs don't seem be under my control.

[Tom fod]

It's a complex and broad set of difficulties and few are affected by all the many difficulties said to be typical.

Some manage ok with gross motor control, but have significant difficulty with tasks that require fine motor control (for example sewing or working on curcuit boards)
Others struggle with, visual perception and spatial awareness, short term memory and sequencing actions as per instructions received.

It has been suggested that people grow out of the condition but many think it's more a case that we develop effective coping strategies to mitigate. Sadly we can somtimes be affected by the imposition of change to the degree our ability to employ coping strategies can be compomised and/or overwhelmed.

Maintaining these coping strategies can be tiring and this takes its toll on our wellbeing as we may use avoidance as a strategy but feel guilty for doing so.

[Xenavire]

You certainly sound like you are among your peers here. I myself have little difficulty (as an adult) throwing and catching balls, yet when I have to sign my name, I physically cannot sign it the same way twice (meaning my signature is just my name in large letters.)


Just because you feel like you can seem "normal" doesn't mean you don't have difficulties doing basic day-to-day things. For example, everyone will probably break a glass or plate sometime in their lives, but few people break them as frequently as I do.

Everyone has a different flavour of Dyspraxia, so don't assume you do or don't have it based purely on the experiences of others. But if you feel like you belong here, you probably do, and it doesn't hurt to make new friends or have a supportive place to come visit.