FEAR - as part of Dys-lexia.

Have you ever seen the parade go by - all the musicians in uniform, blowing, playing, marching - and one of them is so out of step?

Today I am proud to be that person who is so out of step!

After 35 years of working with children with learning difficulties, children with behavioural difficulties, displaced children and emotionally abused children, I have come to a place where I do not accept that LOVE is the prime motivator of the human animal. Nor do I accept that shelter or even survival are the main motivators.

My work with children has finally led me to believe that what is of prime importance to each and every one of us is ACCEPTANCE, and being ACCEPTABLE.  I believe that much of what we do, and in particular, how we do it, is based on a predominating personal fear of not being acceptable. We iron our clothes, we brush our hair, we are cordial in our interactions so as to ensure our acceptability to others.

This is particularly evident in the so-called 'DYS-LEXIC' child where this fear can often become a low-level paranoia. "I am not good enough", "I am not acceptable", "I get it wrong, I will be rejected".  This is so often this child's personal experience, and as a result they do not trust adults, and they do not trust themselves, spending their time watching, waiting for the parental outburst that finally signals that dreaded ultimate rejection.

Being normal human beings, their biggest fear is of fear itself, and so they are forever on edge, watchful, apprehensive, so that when this outburst comes it does not take them by surprise.

The reality of the dys-lexic child in the education system (the diesel child locked into a petrol-based learning system) is a daily experience of failure and inadequacy, and of  'getting the short end of the stick'. Hence they see themselves as being 'less-than-acceptable', of being problematic in style, of being unacceptable to others, and so they live a life dominated by a fear of rejection.

Unfortunately, being normal human beings, they often adopt compensatory responses to their area of difficulty (as a sort-of 'fix-it' response), and inadvertently promote their unacceptability through provocative responses:  they can become sullen, morose, aloof, or emotionally needy; they tend to exaggerate or even lie, and deny responsibility; in particularly negative situations they can even become cheats, thieves and bullies - and inadvertently create the rejection they fear so much.

Because our society has a twisted view of what dys-lexia is (most people think that there is something 'wrong' in the child's brain) we respond inadequately and inapropriately to the diesel (dys-lexic) children in our lives, and in our misunderstanding, often make things worse.

When we understand what 'dys-lexia' really is, we will understand how pivotal confusion with language is to their behaviour, and how we (inadvertently) contribute to this.

For information on my seminars, workshops and books, see my web site www.dyslexiadismantled.com

Laughton King
July 2012