Living with learning disability

Hello, my name is Connie. That’s not my actual name, but in order to protect my daughter, Ann, (also not her real name) it will be the name I use on this website. My background is in healthcare. Initially, I was a nurse for 10 years, and then I went back to school to earn a Master’s degree in both business and health administration. I worked in several advising and management roles over nine years.

The last ten years, I have been home raising my two daughters and trying my best to research and learn about Ann’s learning differences/disability and how to best help her. Recently, I have volunteered to be a parent representative on a board for a magazine that helps children with learning disability / differences.

You may be wondering who or what I am protecting my daughter from, so I will tell you. I am protecting my daughter from a world that does not understand what it truly means to have a learning disability / differences. The list of people I feel she needs protecting from goes on and on.

Few understand learning disability

To give you an example I will list a few: It could be a parent or children in our neighborhood, a member in our church or even many of the teachers in our schools. If you have a child with a learning differences, you know what I am talking about.

If you have not lived with a person with a learning disability / differences, or you have not been exposed to someone with a learning disability / differences, then my hope is that you will continue to read on and learn about learning differences / disability.

Please do not misunderstand me. I am not ashamed or embarrassed to discuss my daughter’s learning differences/disability. However, I have learned from the school of hard knocks over the years that sharing information with the wrong people can harm the very person I was trying to help.

Unfortunately, my experience with learning differences/disability has been in many ways like dealing with a drug addiction problem. Most people would prefer to ignore it rather than talk about it and generally because of the complex nature of learning differences/disability most people truly do not understand or know enough about the issue to help.

In fact, because of their misunderstanding many people have hurt my daughter and our family both intentionally and unintentionally. Like drug addiction, there is a stigma that goes with it.

Decision to develop this website:

My decision to develop a website sprang from a conversation I had with Debbie, a close high school friend. As we were updating and sharing with each other what was happening in our lives, I mentioned to Debbie some of the current issues I was addressing with my daughter Ann and her learning differences/disability.

My conversation with Debbie made me reflect back over the years to the numerous discussions I have had with other people either trying to learn about learning differences or trying to teach and help others learn about the subject. The more I talked to Debbie, the more I was convinced that I could help other people and their families by sharing what I have learned over the past fifteen years. I also believe that by telling our story and helping others, I am also helping my daughter and our family.

My wish list

As your read on, you will see our story along with my “wish list.” The list is comprised of information that I wish someone else would have passed along the way. My hope is that by you having this at your finger tips, your journey might be a bit easier.

What I want to leave you with is hope. Please know that everything you do does make a difference. Know also that the road is long. You have entered a marathon, not a sprint. In order to survive and be successful with your child and your family, you will have to maintain a long-term view. This involves patience and knowing that in the long run, it is all worth it.

Below are the sub-categories of information that I hope will be helpful to you as you learn to deal with learning disability: