Thank you.

I have just as much issue, probably much more, with ME thinking I'm stupid as opposed to others thinking it. I'll elaborate more during the course of this thread, because I'd like to process it.

Aside from getting excessive unsolicited help, being told what I already know, or not being allowed to make mistakes, what causes me to question myself a lot is the fact that relatives so often compared me to my aunt, and she actually was mentally retarded.

Edited to add this instant flashback. Something just this minute occurred to me. Age seven, second grade. I was highly academic, and usually got the highest marks in my class. But I was far from athletic, couldn't run fast, had trouble learning to ride a bicycle, didn't throw a ball well, things like that. We transferred to a new school, where several schoolmates approached my brother and asked, "Is your sister retarded?" Now, we did have our aunt, and we knew she was different, but we had always been told exactly that. "Different." Or "special." Or, as my mother used to explain it to us, "Her body is like an adult, but her mind is like a child." Until we were older, we had never actually heard the word "retarded" applied to our aunt. So, not being clear on what it meant, when they asked my brother if I was retarded, he answered "Yes." This got the entire student body thinking of me as "the retarded kid," and I did not have one single friend. They wouldn't play with me. They laughed at my lack of athletic ability and made fun of any mistakes I made in class. I remember one particular day when the teacher took every girl in the class out into the hallway, two by two, except me. She wouldn't tell me what it was about, but the children gladly did. "Mrs. Wimmer told us we have to be nice to you even though you're a retard." So that's *two* teachers who had me classified that way. Now I'm thoroughly confused.

But that sets the stage for the flashback. My mother got angry with me on one occasion because I couldn't understand what she was telling me to do. That happens sometimes, when one person is an adult and the other is only seven years old. And, knowing what I was going through in school--and remember, this is the one with the retarded sister--she yelled in frustration, "Sometimes I think you might actually BE retarded!" Just moments later she apologized and told me it had been a very unkind thing to say. Yet even then I noticed, and thought to myself but didn't say out loud, "But you didn't say it wasn't true."