You may wonder why I care whether I have dyspraxia or not - after all, I'm long past going to school and I can find ways around the things that are difficult for me. The fateful day that I looked up developmental coordination disorder and then found dyspraxia was the day that my perspective on my whole life changed. We have scripts in our life that we carry with us from our past. Mine sounded something like "I'm clumsy", "I'm stupid", "I have no artistic talent", "I'm lazy", "I'm careless", "I sound like an idiot when I try to socialize with people" and on and on and on. Knowing that my coordination issues were not left behind in childhood and that dyspraxia encompass more than just hand issues means that certain problems that I've had are not my fault.
I drop and break things because of dyspraxia. I'm not stupid, I just think differently from most people. I don't recognize landmarks and get lost because of dyspraxia. I don't drive because of dyspraxia. None of this means that I will give up on trying difficult things. Certain things are difficult for me. Most people have difficulties with some things in their lives. Knowing about dyspraxia means that I can drop, break, trip, walk into people and things, get lost, temporarily forget random words or skills, be awkward socially and all my other quirks and know that it isn't my fault. There is a lot of power in being able to let the self-blame go.
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