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wispfoxI'm currently fascinated by the description of nonverbal learning disorder (N(V)LD), because it describes me (especially as a child, before I learned lots of coping mechanisms and did a fair amount of forcing certain things to be not quite as bad) far better than either Asperger's or high-functioning autism does.
This is the first post of two, and it's taken me since mid-day Sunday (with probably 4-5 hours each day since then, including today) to manage to organize this to the point I feel ok posting it. :)
(and, as one might imagine from the amount of time it's taken me, both posts are pretty long!)
---
I attempt to summarize N(V)LD, using stuff from Nonverbal Learning Disorders (which I find poorly organized for how my brain works):
I'd never before even considered that my spatial and motoric stuff were related to my trouble with nonverbal communication, so that really caught my attention.
---
An overview of Autism Spectrum Disorders, including a general sense of the differences between them. This link includes a summary table, which pleases me immensely.
When looking at the summary table, I was finding strong resonnance with the following pieces (described in my words, not the table's words):
---
Less generally, from Neurobehavioral Characteristics Seen in the Classroom:
Oh, my, yes. I am known in my family for my amazing ability to get myself lost, even if I'd traversed the same path multiple times already. Getting lost and being in unexpected situations are fairly major panic triggers for me, although I mostly have my panic reaction controlled at this point (because, as was explained to me, panic won't improve anything) - I might panic briefly at this point, but I'll force myself past it at least enough to do _something_ besides panic. It might not be the most useful something, mind (most often, it'll entail me attempting to make verbal contact with someone who might be able to help. My cell phone is my friend), but it'll be something other than complete panic. (possible exception being if there isn't anything I _can_ do - being trapped is _bad_)
Getting lost is worse than other types of unexpected situations (perhaps because there tends to be less forewarning, and because there's simply more that is unexpected), but both are _much_ less bad than they used to be, and being with someone else with whom I am aquainted helps amazingly (perhaps because I tend to assume that other people don't have these problems, and being aquainted with them means I'm willing to verbalize at them/ask for help, depending).
Organization (although mostly externally oriented) was drilled into me from an early age (to the point of obsession), mostly because if I forget and don't organize something, there is very little chance I'll find it again - in _and_ out of my head. It's why I write things down so very much. I won't remember/be able to access it again otherwise.
My spatial awareness, at least in terms of getting lost, is better. Not _great_, but better. Through lots, and lots of practice. And, interestingly (consdering how much I avoided learning how), driving has helped a lot with this. Of course, this may relate more to the fact that I force myself to go places more often now than the driving itself. I also tend to have directions written _down_ now, with insane amounts of detail, which helps a lot with the concern about being lost, and with my ability to slowly learn how to traverse my way to a specific location.
My ability to really understand 3-D stuff is, again, better than when I was a kid. I _can_, now, sometimes (briefly) understand 3-D concepts without finding some other way to think of it. But it's difficult, and _very_ effortful. Takes most of my processing power to do it. On the plus side, most interaction with the world doesn't actually _need_ 3-D awareness (much, apparently, to many people's surprise - I tend to get a lot of 'well, how do you do [thing] then?', for which my reply is that I don't understand how it requires spatial awareness. There are exceptions, like the fact that I can_not_ understand torque. Completely stumps me, and caused me major problems in Physics II in college, since the 2nd half of the semester was lots of things needing spatial awareness). Actually, physics in general often simply baffles my brain...
Um. Yeah. Transitions are still something I really don't like, but at least now I can cope with them with sufficient warning. Ditto with unexpected change - if I can refuse or escape it, it's _much_ easier for me to handle.
And my Palm is the best thing I ever purchased. Seriously. I can make lists of things! And organize things! And not have to rely on what's in my head! Organization also makes it possible for me to find things (in and out of my head) later. Indeed, I suspect that the processing that I've mentioned before _is_ how I organize things in my head. At least the part involving the taking in of new information.
I suspect that it was a _very_ good thing that a strong interest in learning was instilled in me at an early age, or I'd never get over the hurdle of the transition required to _do_ new things. On the plus side, though, the more new things I do, the more possibly relating things I have available in my head to draw upon. I tend to have trouble seeing how things interrelate (more detail in next section), but I _can_ do it sometime. Especially if I have the aforementioned 'warning time' before new things actually happen.
You know what people call 'common sense'? This is it. Right here. I don't have it. I can _sometimes_ figure things out, with effort, and very much not on the fly. I have to _think_ about it, and realize that there might be a connection. Even then, I might not manage it. Much, much, _much_ easier if people simply _tell_ me straight out the things that are supposed to be obvious. Because, to me, they are not. And if they are stated in the appropriate context, _then_ I can make the connection, and maybe be able to use it later (more probable if the connection has been made multiple times).
Again, though, this is something that requires me to have time to process the new information in order to be able to possibly access it later.
I hated it when people would say things like 'use your head' in situations that would require me to make appropriate connections between what is happening and what I should do. (I wonder if this is why I still am uncomfortable around my sister-in-law? She keeps bringing a specific example of this up... This kind of thing is one of the things I'm really _bad_ at handling being teased about. Still.)
I love, however, when other people can give me words for things I'm struggling to find words for, or for things I didn't even know I needed words for. Oh, yes. This is probably why I'm _so_ fond of giving everyone else my words. :)
This is one of the ones that startled me as being related. I can't follow more than two or three step spoken instructions because I lose track after that point, even though I don't try to remember anything verbatim (I can't*). I _need_ instructions to be written down (this is why I'm good at writing test plans - I write everything down as part of learning how to do things _anyway_), so I can refer to them. (most people visualize themselves doing things in order to be able to do them in the right order later?! What?)
I wonder if this is part of why I prefer necessary information be written down? Not (as I thought was the case) because I'm not as good with processing spoken information (although it's also true), but because I need to be able to refer to things later in order to best remember/process/comprehend them. And written down is far better than trying to organize/store sufficiently complex or sequential things in my head. (I can't figure out how come 'most' NVLD people manage to get by with rote memorization. How does one organize that? How does one access that? I can't do it...)
Some more visual-spatial-organizational stuff which applies to me, from the N(V)LD article:
I am _very_ bad at visualizing much of anything, although now I can at least manage to visualize some things, briefly (the things in my head are not generally visual - even my mental pictures are more about motion than anything else, and are _really_ cartoon-like and low on non-necessary details). I'm also very prone to noticing details and not overall pictures of things (generally). I suspect my amazing difficulty with describing people's physical form and possibly my difficulty with recognizing people relates to this (this feels like it relates somewhat to the possibly face blind traits I have, as well).
I do, in fact, tend to verbally label lots of what goes on around me, and had never considered that it might relate before now. :)
The description relating to labeling things and finding my way around new places is accurate enough, although how I label things is not - annoyingly enough - even vaguely useful for giving anyone directions. I have to consciously be intending to create directions in order to manage it. And it tends to take a few runthroughs.
I do, in fact, also use things like counting houses (street lights, cross roads, etc), labeling specific envionmental markers, and similar to manage to find my way places.
---
*I used to think that I did not store things verbally - this is not so. I do not store rote facts on a long-term basis, because I need a 'why' in order to undersand and therefore remember things. I do not recognize people in a face-based manner, and instead use my 'sense' of a person (this refers to a bit of the reason I continue to believe I'm slightly face blind; the other part being my difficulty with recognizing people), combined with how they move and other things. But my index for things _is_ verbal, albeit very, very, very, very condenced (down to what I tend to refer to as concepts - the verbal version, since I appear to also have nonverbal concepts in my non-indexed, non-verbal, deep-level and often emotional section of thinking). This almost certainly explains both my intense need for processing input - organization and condencing down to concept/summary/as few words as possible level, as well as my intense need to get things from deep in my head (nonverbal, generally based on how things 'feel' to me, generally where I obtain information about my reactions to things) to short summary word form. The shorter I can get a nonverbal concept into words (the verbal concept), the easier it is for me to index. As well, the more clearly I word something, the more effective the translation to words and the more useful the information for later access and retrieval. I very much do _not_ do word-for-word, probably because I discarded it early on as an inefficient indexing method. (Interesting how this works, considering my difficulty with proper nouns; I probably only use proper nouns for people, and try to use consice but descriptive words for everything else)
I don't _think_ my difficulty finding the words I want (even though I know they exist and that I've used them before) relates, but it's difficult to tell. It could easily be an organizational problem, since individual words are less easy to attach to other things for easy access. All I know is that it often feel like whatever it is that I use to access words isn't always actually _working_ (kinda like an intermittant bus error, maybe).
This all may or may not explain my tendancy to overuse certain words and phrases so as to communicate specific ideas/reactions to things without having to find new words.
This is the first post of two, and it's taken me since mid-day Sunday (with probably 4-5 hours each day since then, including today) to manage to organize this to the point I feel ok posting it. :)
(and, as one might imagine from the amount of time it's taken me, both posts are pretty long!)
---
I attempt to summarize N(V)LD, using stuff from Nonverbal Learning Disorders (which I find poorly organized for how my brain works):
The NLD syndrome reveals itself in impaired abilities to organize the visual-spatial field, adapt to new or novel situations, and/or accurately read nonverbal signals and cues. [...] It is known that nonverbal learning disabilities involve the performance processes (generally thought of neurologically as originating in the right cerebral hemisphere of the brain, which specializes in nonverbal processing) [...] diminished access to and/or disordered functioning of the right-hemisphere systems impedes all understanding and adaptive learning
Three categories of dysfunction present themselves: (1) motoric (lack of coordination, severe balance problems and/or difficulties with fine graphomotor skills), (2) visual-spatial-organizational (lack of image, poor visual recall, faulty spatial perceptions, and/or difficulties with spatial relations), and (3) social (lack of ability to comprehend nonverbal communication, difficulties adjusting to transitions and novel situations, and/or significant deficits in social judgment and social interaction).
I'd never before even considered that my spatial and motoric stuff were related to my trouble with nonverbal communication, so that really caught my attention.
---
An overview of Autism Spectrum Disorders, including a general sense of the differences between them. This link includes a summary table, which pleases me immensely.
When looking at the summary table, I was finding strong resonnance with the following pieces (described in my words, not the table's words):
- NVLD includes less trouble with seeing other people _as_ other people than Asperger's does
I had some problems with this as a kid, with some very infrequent occurances of it even now, but it was not pervasive by the time I was in school. And, I tend to be decent at getting into other people's minds (probably through long practice) if I have sufficient background in whatever it is that makes me want to do so. - significantly less trouble with eye contact than Asperger's
Some of this, especially if I need to think hard about something. For the most part, though, I can do eye contact fairly well (if I'm not paying attention, _too_ well - excessive intensity). - decent at showing interest in interacting with other people, even though there's a low success rate due to nonverbal communication difficulties
Apparently Aspies appear uninterested in other people interaction, even though they desire it. As far as I am aware, that's not something I've tended to have problems with. I just didn't know how to interact very well for much of my life. - have significantly less difficulty with 'make believe' and symbolic representations of things than Asperger's
Heh. I spent more time distracted by things in my head than probably anthing else, growing up. I was one _hell_ of a spacey child. - have significant spatial problems
Uh, yeah. I go into greater detail on this later. - have a fair amount of gross and fine motor problems.
Yeah. Some quotes from "Nonverbal Learning Disorders" link mentioned above describes it better than I can:It has been said that such a child always "draws" and never actually learns to "write" (it's not too difficult to imagine the consequences this causes in school).
[...]
All writing tasks will be slow and arduous. Copying accurately from the board or a book are impractical and agonizing for this child.
Both of these are very true for me. I _can_ write, but the amount of attention it requires makes it not worthwhile for anything other than very short things. Otherwise, my handwriting deteriorates beyond recognition really quickly (because I'm not paying attention to the movements required to write), I lose track of whatever it is that I want to say, and whatever I write is _completely_ disorganized (I use the fact that things can be moved around on a computer a _lot_).
On the plus side, the fact that I use brief descriptive words as indexes in my head* works well with this, because I only need very short bits of writing in order to still be able to figure out what I wanted to think more on later. (I am, however, not entirely sure how I manage to be able to find things using my index and still not actually be able to find a specific word well enough to _say_ it - but this may be why I did not realize that I index things verbally before now)
I _vividly_ remember thinking that I was a terrible writer when I did most of my writing by hand. It was _such_ an amazing experience when I finally stopped disbelieving my mother (because I couldn't figure out why typing would be easier) and tried to write on a computer regularly for things.
Interestingly, dysgraphia is mentioned in the NVLD article relating to motoric stuff - which I am - but I am dysgraphic on the computer, too. I do it less, certainly, and it's easier to notice and fix, but I still do it. Specifically, I will randomly lose words or phrases, use a different - and sometimes opposite - word or phrase from the one I intended, will get letters in words all out of order, and will flip word order around. I seem to do some of this in speech, as well, though - especially the parts about word order and using different - sometimes opposite - words from what I was thinking of in my head. No idea if this relates to any of the rest of this.
I also tend to walk into things, often. I'm fairly decent about avoiding this when alert, but it's not at all unusual for me to find bruises and have no idea where they came from. Also fairly good at recovering from almost tripping because I do it so much. Seriously klutzy, me, unless it's something I spent a _lot_ of time attempting to address (like waitressing).
I wonder if any of this relates to my poor physical-self attachment.
I will note that, for me, motoric seems to be the least dramatically affected of all the categories in question, and not nearly as bad as is apparently common for N(V)LD people.
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Less generally, from Neurobehavioral Characteristics Seen in the Classroom:
Has difficulty finding her way around and is often lost or tardy. The student with NLD has difficulty with internal and external organization, visual-spatial orientation, directional concepts and coordination. Getting lost on campus and/or arriving tardy for class are predicaments this child must struggle with daily. [...] Panic sets in when this child feels "ambushed" or does not know what to expect.
Oh, my, yes. I am known in my family for my amazing ability to get myself lost, even if I'd traversed the same path multiple times already. Getting lost and being in unexpected situations are fairly major panic triggers for me, although I mostly have my panic reaction controlled at this point (because, as was explained to me, panic won't improve anything) - I might panic briefly at this point, but I'll force myself past it at least enough to do _something_ besides panic. It might not be the most useful something, mind (most often, it'll entail me attempting to make verbal contact with someone who might be able to help. My cell phone is my friend), but it'll be something other than complete panic. (possible exception being if there isn't anything I _can_ do - being trapped is _bad_)
Getting lost is worse than other types of unexpected situations (perhaps because there tends to be less forewarning, and because there's simply more that is unexpected), but both are _much_ less bad than they used to be, and being with someone else with whom I am aquainted helps amazingly (perhaps because I tend to assume that other people don't have these problems, and being aquainted with them means I'm willing to verbalize at them/ask for help, depending).
Organization (although mostly externally oriented) was drilled into me from an early age (to the point of obsession), mostly because if I forget and don't organize something, there is very little chance I'll find it again - in _and_ out of my head. It's why I write things down so very much. I won't remember/be able to access it again otherwise.
My spatial awareness, at least in terms of getting lost, is better. Not _great_, but better. Through lots, and lots of practice. And, interestingly (consdering how much I avoided learning how), driving has helped a lot with this. Of course, this may relate more to the fact that I force myself to go places more often now than the driving itself. I also tend to have directions written _down_ now, with insane amounts of detail, which helps a lot with the concern about being lost, and with my ability to slowly learn how to traverse my way to a specific location.
My ability to really understand 3-D stuff is, again, better than when I was a kid. I _can_, now, sometimes (briefly) understand 3-D concepts without finding some other way to think of it. But it's difficult, and _very_ effortful. Takes most of my processing power to do it. On the plus side, most interaction with the world doesn't actually _need_ 3-D awareness (much, apparently, to many people's surprise - I tend to get a lot of 'well, how do you do [thing] then?', for which my reply is that I don't understand how it requires spatial awareness. There are exceptions, like the fact that I can_not_ understand torque. Completely stumps me, and caused me major problems in Physics II in college, since the 2nd half of the semester was lots of things needing spatial awareness). Actually, physics in general often simply baffles my brain...
Has difficulty coping with changes in routine and transitions.
The student with NLD generally copes well in a structured predictable environment. However, he will experience extreme stress when faced with forced or unexpected changes in routine. Because this child lacks internal organizational skills, he will need extra assistance in this area. [...] Adequate "warning time" will be required before the introduction of any novel event.
Um. Yeah. Transitions are still something I really don't like, but at least now I can cope with them with sufficient warning. Ditto with unexpected change - if I can refuse or escape it, it's _much_ easier for me to handle.
And my Palm is the best thing I ever purchased. Seriously. I can make lists of things! And organize things! And not have to rely on what's in my head! Organization also makes it possible for me to find things (in and out of my head) later. Indeed, I suspect that the processing that I've mentioned before _is_ how I organize things in my head. At least the part involving the taking in of new information.
I suspect that it was a _very_ good thing that a strong interest in learning was instilled in me at an early age, or I'd never get over the hurdle of the transition required to _do_ new things. On the plus side, though, the more new things I do, the more possibly relating things I have available in my head to draw upon. I tend to have trouble seeing how things interrelate (more detail in next section), but I _can_ do it sometime. Especially if I have the aforementioned 'warning time' before new things actually happen.
Has difficulty generalizing previously learned information
Generalization is the transfer and application of previous learning to new situations and contexts. We are constantly making spontaneous connections, realizing that a particular concept applies to a wide range of topics and/or recognizing that a particular strategy might apply to a number of situations. The student with NLD is stymied when confronted with a situation which she has not previously encountered, even if the new situation is only slightly different from one for which she has previously developed a successful strategy. This child is often unable to understand what is expected of her because she is unable to apply rules and principles learned at other times and in other situations to a situation she currently faces. Difficulty generalizing information will cause problems in modifying learned patterns to make them applicable to new situations and in prediction of outcome.
You know what people call 'common sense'? This is it. Right here. I don't have it. I can _sometimes_ figure things out, with effort, and very much not on the fly. I have to _think_ about it, and realize that there might be a connection. Even then, I might not manage it. Much, much, _much_ easier if people simply _tell_ me straight out the things that are supposed to be obvious. Because, to me, they are not. And if they are stated in the appropriate context, _then_ I can make the connection, and maybe be able to use it later (more probable if the connection has been made multiple times).
Again, though, this is something that requires me to have time to process the new information in order to be able to possibly access it later.
I hated it when people would say things like 'use your head' in situations that would require me to make appropriate connections between what is happening and what I should do. (I wonder if this is why I still am uncomfortable around my sister-in-law? She keeps bringing a specific example of this up... This kind of thing is one of the things I'm really _bad_ at handling being teased about. Still.)
I love, however, when other people can give me words for things I'm struggling to find words for, or for things I didn't even know I needed words for. Oh, yes. This is probably why I'm _so_ fond of giving everyone else my words. :)
Has difficulty following multi-step instructions
[...] Most students remember a series of instructions by visualizing themselves performing each step in the series. They don't try to remember each word (verbatim) in a long string of directives. However, because the student with NLD is unable to pass this information to the right hemisphere and visualize the sequence, he attempts to memorize every word as it is said to him. He is then expected to act upon the directives in the prescribed sequential manner. This, of course, is much more difficult than simply storing factual information (and proves to be less effective).
This is one of the ones that startled me as being related. I can't follow more than two or three step spoken instructions because I lose track after that point, even though I don't try to remember anything verbatim (I can't*). I _need_ instructions to be written down (this is why I'm good at writing test plans - I write everything down as part of learning how to do things _anyway_), so I can refer to them. (most people visualize themselves doing things in order to be able to do them in the right order later?! What?)
I wonder if this is part of why I prefer necessary information be written down? Not (as I thought was the case) because I'm not as good with processing spoken information (although it's also true), but because I need to be able to refer to things later in order to best remember/process/comprehend them. And written down is far better than trying to organize/store sufficiently complex or sequential things in my head. (I can't figure out how come 'most' NVLD people manage to get by with rote memorization. How does one organize that? How does one access that? I can't do it...)
Some more visual-spatial-organizational stuff which applies to me, from the N(V)LD article:
This child does not form visual images and therefore cannot revisualize something he has seen previously. He focuses on the details of what he sees and often fails to grasp the "total picture". [...] She needs to "verbally" (albeit subconsciously) label everything that happens around her [...]
The NLD child must employ intense forethought to label everything he comes into contact with in his environment. Owing to faulty perceptions, these labels may be incorrect, but the child perseveres because this is his only accessible means of processing the information. He does not form the visual images which help the rest of us to recognize and comprehend something we've seen or a place we've been before. This causes extreme difficulty for him in trying to find his way in new places. [...]
The child with nonverbal learning disorders constantly "talks himself through" situations as a means of verbally compensating for his motoric and visual-spatial defciencies. Although he may be unaware of the spatial position his house occupies in the neighborhood, he will find his way back from a friends house by counting homes which come in between, labeling environmental markers, and/or recounting a sequence of details which he has taken pains to label and commit to verbal memoir.
I am _very_ bad at visualizing much of anything, although now I can at least manage to visualize some things, briefly (the things in my head are not generally visual - even my mental pictures are more about motion than anything else, and are _really_ cartoon-like and low on non-necessary details). I'm also very prone to noticing details and not overall pictures of things (generally). I suspect my amazing difficulty with describing people's physical form and possibly my difficulty with recognizing people relates to this (this feels like it relates somewhat to the possibly face blind traits I have, as well).
I do, in fact, tend to verbally label lots of what goes on around me, and had never considered that it might relate before now. :)
The description relating to labeling things and finding my way around new places is accurate enough, although how I label things is not - annoyingly enough - even vaguely useful for giving anyone directions. I have to consciously be intending to create directions in order to manage it. And it tends to take a few runthroughs.
I do, in fact, also use things like counting houses (street lights, cross roads, etc), labeling specific envionmental markers, and similar to manage to find my way places.
---
*I used to think that I did not store things verbally - this is not so. I do not store rote facts on a long-term basis, because I need a 'why' in order to undersand and therefore remember things. I do not recognize people in a face-based manner, and instead use my 'sense' of a person (this refers to a bit of the reason I continue to believe I'm slightly face blind; the other part being my difficulty with recognizing people), combined with how they move and other things. But my index for things _is_ verbal, albeit very, very, very, very condenced (down to what I tend to refer to as concepts - the verbal version, since I appear to also have nonverbal concepts in my non-indexed, non-verbal, deep-level and often emotional section of thinking). This almost certainly explains both my intense need for processing input - organization and condencing down to concept/summary/as few words as possible level, as well as my intense need to get things from deep in my head (nonverbal, generally based on how things 'feel' to me, generally where I obtain information about my reactions to things) to short summary word form. The shorter I can get a nonverbal concept into words (the verbal concept), the easier it is for me to index. As well, the more clearly I word something, the more effective the translation to words and the more useful the information for later access and retrieval. I very much do _not_ do word-for-word, probably because I discarded it early on as an inefficient indexing method. (Interesting how this works, considering my difficulty with proper nouns; I probably only use proper nouns for people, and try to use consice but descriptive words for everything else)
I don't _think_ my difficulty finding the words I want (even though I know they exist and that I've used them before) relates, but it's difficult to tell. It could easily be an organizational problem, since individual words are less easy to attach to other things for easy access. All I know is that it often feel like whatever it is that I use to access words isn't always actually _working_ (kinda like an intermittant bus error, maybe).
This all may or may not explain my tendancy to overuse certain words and phrases so as to communicate specific ideas/reactions to things without having to find new words.
