I know loads of people who are diagnosed with dyslexia. I do not know a single person who is diagnosed with dyscalculia. Hell, my spellcheck doesn't even know dyscalculia is a word.
I was regarded as a "smart kid" and therefore when, around age 10 (when we really started learning proper math beyond memorizing times tables), my math grades dropped off a cliff, I was disciplined. There were parent-teacher conferences. No extra help was given. I was punished for making mistakes, yelled at by my parents, lectured by my teachers. My math ability got worse and worse the older I got. I never caught up. When I tried to take an entry-level calculus class in university to get my math credit, I had regular panic attacks because none of it made ANY fucking sense whatsoever. When people started talking about numbers it was like they started just making up words and then looking at me like I was insane when I couldn't understand their made-up bullshit language.
I can't remember numbers, not even single digits, for more than a second or two. I can't do basic math in my head. I can't work out how to convert a word problem (or a basic life problem) into math and numbers. I've never been able to learn how to code because although I understand the logic just fine, inevitably a number appears and my brain instantly goes blue screen of death.
When I'm exercising, I can't even keep track of how many reps I've done. I literally can't count my push-ups while I'm doing them. If I'm just counting and focusing solely on the numbers, I usually don't lose count, but the second even the tiniest thing distracts me, I have absolutely no idea where I just left off. Out the window, instantly. The only way I can count is to use my fingers. (I have a system. My left hand, starting with the thumb, goes 1-5 across the hand. Then I fold them back down in the same order, thumb first, for 6-10. When I hit 10, that's my right thumb, and the system carries on in this way, so I can count to 100 on my fingers.)
I only learned the word "dyscalculia" recently, in my late 30s. I have all the traits except that I didn't struggle to learn to count when I was little. I asked my psychiatrist if I might have it and he shrugged, said "that's normally diagnosed in childhood", and that was the end of the conversation. He didn't even have a suggestion for where I could get more information or a formal diagnosis.
Math is NOT supposed to be hard. But I always believed it was just some universally nightmarish concept because that's how it felt for me, and when I complained that I didn't understand, I'd be lectured that "math is just hard" and told to try harder. I thought it was normal. For nearly four decades!!!
This is definitely an element of the whole stigma around math. There are probably loads of people like me who have no idea they actually have a disability because no one ever talks about it. And then they pass on the idea that math is evil to the children in their care. I was a primary school teacher for six years. I can only hope I didn't pass that fear along to those kids (I was an English teacher, at least, so math didn't come up very often).
If you find math absurdly difficult, you might have a disability. If you just find it scary, you were probably taught to think of it that way. Don't pass it on. This is at least one thing we can make better for future generations.
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