Something leora said prompted this.

[conuly]

I have problems. Seriously, I do.

But I don't ever like mentioning them, ever, because I always feel like I'm whining or exaggerating.

Take the idea of faceblindess. I don't think I'm faceblind. I don't consider myself faceblind. And yet, there's a number of incidents which only make sense if I say I'm faceblind. Most notoriously, there's the time I was about to tell a man with a cute baby "my niece has that same outfit" when I realized that it *was* my niece and brother-in-law, but trust me when I say this incident is not alone in my memory.

Or there's my hearing. I have very good hearing. My hearing is probably better than yours. I can hear the train doors close from several blocks away. But I can't be in a crowded room and follow a conversation. I never used to mention this to people, and just sat through "group work" where I either did nothing or did everything because it was easier than trying to listen to people talking. I still don't like mentioning it to people, because it's just "Well, my hearing isn't bad, exactly, but it's hard for me sometimes, but not all the time, and... um...."

Riiiiight.

Well, this has been my melodramatic post for the day. Djusk' a!

Comments

[leora.livejournal.com]

It is hard to say. I'd much rather have a formal diagnosis of CAPD. But I just fit it so well. I always had problems understanding speech, but my hearing always tested out as fine. I did well in school, except I got totally lost in Spanish when it became full-immersion. The teacher stopped writing the assignments on the board and just told us, and I had enough problem getting that information spoken in English.

I've always had to ask people to repeat themselves multiple times. And have the little personal rule of I have someone repeat something twice, if I still don't get it, I smile and nod. But I've gotten much better results since I've taught people to repeat what they have to say, but with more spacing between their words. I also can often sort something out, now that I specifically replay the sounds and think about how I can move the sound breaks to try to come up with alternate meanings. That and the massive increase of hearing problems when I went blind just seem to really fit a picture of CAPD.

I do know the dangers of self-diagnosis... I majored in psychology and they give you really big warnings about it. It's very easy to start to think you have every problem in the book. But then, you look at something and lots of people look at it and go, wow that'd be weird to have, and you go, wow, that's been my whole life... and it just feels like a good diagnosis.