Telling your dyslexia story in person
This is the 6th in a series of 9 blogs by a member of Dyslexia Scotland.
Our current discussion point in this blog series is telling your dyslexia story. In the previous post we:
- looked at the potential benefits of telling your dyslexia story; and
- acknowledged that it is up to you whether you share your dyslexia story or not
In this blog post and the 3 that follow it, we are going to:
- Revisit the ways other people have told their dyslexia stories that we looked at in blog posts 3 and 4. This time we will look at them from the perspective of you telling your own dyslexia story; and
- Look at some other ways that you can tell your dyslexia story.
Some approaches apply to sharing your story. Others apply to keeping your story to yourself and potentially sharing it later.
In this blog post, we are going to look at the first of these approaches: telling your dyslexia story in person.
A. Telling your dyslexia story at meetings or events
It can be really helpful to tell other dyslexics your story because they may have had similar experiences, or be able to empathise with you (i.e. put themselves in your shoes) easily.
- Dyslexia Scotland meetings e.g. the Glasgow Adult Dyslexic Group has had a meeting each year for the past 2 years on ‘Members’ Dyslexia Experiences’. For details, see the section entitled ‘The Adult Network’ at http://www.dyslexiascotland.org.uk/adults
2. Dyslexia Awareness Week events
- perhaps there would be an opportunity for you to speak at one of these
- Contact Dyslexia Scotland in the first instance: tel. 01786 446650 or email info@dyslexiascotland.org.uk
3. Lexxic meet-ups – see http://www.lexxic.com/meetup
4. Organise your own meetings e.g. invite a dyslexic friend or contact for a chat
B. Telling your dyslexia story in counselling
Talking to a counsellor can be helpful in a different way from talking to dyslexic peers. A counsellor might not have 1st-hand experience of dyslexia, but is trained to listen with empathy.
- If you have had dyslexia experiences that bother you, talking to a counsellor can help you come to terms with them
- Choosing to tell your story to a counsellor means you bare your soul to one person only, in a confidential environment. Your relationship with a counsellor is professional. This means that, compared to your personal contacts, counsellors are able to help you without emotional involvement acting as an obstacle
- If you are referred for counselling or another psychological therapy through the NHS, it will be free of charge
- For further information on the benefits of counselling for dyslexics see
- ‘Making Dyslexia Work for You – A self-help guide’ by Vicki Goodwin and Bonita Thomson, pp 36-37, 140-141; and
- ‘Dyslexia and Mental Health – Exposing its poisonous roots’ by Robert McCormack at http://www.cosca.org.uk/docs/COSCA%20Journal%20Summer%202010%20pp112-23-14.pdf
5. For further information on counselling see:
- the video ‘Person to Person – COSCA’s guide to counselling’ at http://www.cosca.org.uk
- http://www.nhs.uk/conditions/Counselling/Pages/Introduction.aspx (there is a video right at the foot of the webpage)
In this, the 6th blog post in our series, we have started exploring some of the ways you can tell your own dyslexia story. We have done this by looking at ways you can share your dyslexia story with others in person. We have seen that this can be done at meetings or events and in counselling.
In the next blog post, we go on to explore 2 more ways you can tell your dyslexia story, namely on video and in audio.
References
- 1) Vicki Goodwin and Bonita Thomson: ‘Making Dyslexia Work for You – A Self-help guide’. Published by David Fulton, 2004. ISBN 9 781843 120919. The page numbers in this blog post refer to the 2004 edition, although they may also apply to the 2nd edition, published in 2012.
- 2) Robert McCormack: ‘Dyslexia and Mental Health – Exposing its poisonous roots’ in ‘Counselling in Scotland’, the journal of COSCA, Summer 2010, pages 4-7.
A life less ordinary 