#uneven functioning

Other People: You're so self aware.

When things that are hard for most people come easily to you, but you struggle with things most people find second nature:

People make a fuss over you when you do things that come relatively naturally to you.  That makes it hard to take compliments.

People take it for granted when you put forth monumental effort to do things you find almost impossible--and heap scorn on you if you do badly. So you become afraid to do badly and be "found out."

Dr. Hallowell, who has ADHD, says it’s like driving a Ferrari with the brakes of a bicycle. It’s fast, powerful, and hard to stop.

I like that this metaphor describes strengths as well as weaknesses of ADHD, but it doesn’t fit my experience very well.

I recently discovered, mixed in with a bunch of drawings and writing from my childhood, a standardized test I took when I was eight years old. I didn’t even know I had taken any tests at that age, but there it was, a copy of the Weschler Individual Achievement Test (WIAT-I)--the test of academic skills that complements the better-known Wechsler IQ test.

One small detail at the end of the report blew my mind...and explained a lot about my life.

Not only was there a significant difference between my reading and math composite scores, but only one half of one percent of the reference population had at least that great a gap. Now, keep in mind that math isn’t even my weakest skill. If anything, it’s one of my strongest weaknesses. So it’s no surprise people don’t know what to make of the giant gaps in my skill set, because they’ve probably never met anyone as lopsided. They’ve never had reason to learn that such unevenness is even possible.