DR RYLAND GRACE // dyspraxia [pt. 1]
a collection of dyspraxic/DCD grace headcanons from yours truly!
dr ryland grace has a learning difficulty. this changes very little, because you can still have a doctorate, be the world's foremost expert on astrophage biology, and save two planets from dimming suns with a learning difficulty.
haven't read the book (yet, it is on the way!!!), but i couldn't help myself LMAO i'll make a part 2 once i do because i KNOW it'll give me more ideas.
i think his fine motor skills are stronger than his gross ones, generally. his handwriting's decent, if only because of how often he uses it in the classroom. gross motor skills, though? diabolically bad. he'll trip over everything and nothing, bump into doors, counters, other people.
on the petrova taskforce, and later the hail mary, he struggles a lot in the hazmat suits and his spacesuit because he's just so much bulkier than he's used to.
he's forever bumping his head on rocky's xenonite tunnels, no matter how long they've been there for.
he can tie his shoelaces; it just takes him a minute. if he's only going to be moving around a little bit, he doesn't usually bother.
he's a VERY visual thinker; he finds drawing things out works best, but anything goes as long as it's physically in front of him. super creative to boot, and loves classroom crafts.
it works great for his kids too, and later rocky and the eridians. he LOVES showing things in action and getting them involved in experiments and crafts, versus just talking at them and expecting them to understand it.
on the hail mary, he's DELIGHTED to find the puppet shows work for rocky, because they work SO well for him as well. they'll do them for each other whenever something's getting lost in translation.
his working memory and organisation isn't great; he loses things like his keys often anyway, but if something's not in its designated spot? gone forever.
on earth, he lived by calendars, post-it notes and notes app lists to keep him on time and on track. everything from parent-teacher conferences to shopping lists had to be written down. it helped significantly, but he'd still forget something or other most days.
on the hail mary he prefers keeping the centrifugal gravity going as often as possible when he and rocky are doing 'big science', because as soon as they move into zero gravity everything floats around and he cannot find anything.
i do think this becomes slightly more of an issue after he hits his head jettisoning the fuel tanks near adrian.
i think he would've been diagnosed later in life, maybe as an undergrad student; he was always pretty academic despite how much he would've struggled, so nobody took much notice growing up. i think he would've pursued it partly out of curiosity, just to know why he is the way he is.
some of his low self-esteem stems from growing up feeling like there was something wrong with him, because he couldn't do the things other kids could. he struggled badly with sports, and would find ways to get out of doing them (took up science extracurriculars, etc).
on the hail mary, this shows up when he's doing his pilot training with rocky. he's usually endlessly patient, but struggling to control the ship hits a sore spot, especially with rocky teasing him (not that he knows any better, of course). they have a talk, and once he understands, rocky lays off a bit.
he's always covered in bruises, and can rarely tell where they've come from. armando frets over him endlessly.
it's not something he's ashamed of (anymore), nor something he advertises; it's just part of him. if he needs accommodations, he'll ask for them.
as a teacher, he had slightly longer to tidy and set up his classroom between lessons.
on the petrova taskforce, it helped to have someone (usually carl) to bounce ideas off and help him with his experiments. if there was a lot going on, stratt would sometimes come to him for meetings or quick chats, rather than asking him to remember to come to her.
