The more I come back to this thread, the more I feel stupid. I can't even really think about how to put my thoughts down in writing.

Growing up I was teased/made fun of for failing at simple tasks. Always followed by a "[You need to be] smarter than the machine/whatever it was". I wasn't able to ride a bike as a kid. I even tried again as an adult and I can sort of do it, but not well enough to actually ride anywhere. And no one seems to understand how it feels to not be able to do something virtually ever small child can do. I had speech issues growing up...I remember working with a speech therapist. Talking clearly can still be an issue now but in most cases, no one notices. Unless of course, it's one of the words I struggle with every time...which makes you feel stupid in front of your professors when you have to use the word and you can't pronounce it. I have a difficult time remembering things and recalling the right information at the moment. I memorize a lot of things based on patterns...maybe why I was better at math than classes that required more memorization of facts? I also can't remember/process instructions/directions etc. aurally very well. If I'm given driving directions, they must be written or given to me one at a time or I'll only remember the last one I'm told.

In my career field, there are simple things and things that I have to be able to do that I really struggle with because of attention problems and physical limitations and it makes me feel so inferior. If you're teaching music to little kids, you're also teaching them to snap their fingers. I can only snap with one hand. I always had a hard time with music dictation (or transcription) or learning music by ear because of memory and attention.

All in all, I look dumb but people find out that I'm smart so I'm always afraid I'm going to be made fun of for looking dumb. And yet I could write complex music with little score study...I mean, every composer is "supposed" to study scores, but I only did it if I had to. I pretty much got everything I needed from playing other people's music and by instinct. So maybe some sort of idiot savant...I don't know.

All I know is I feel inferior to almost everyone pretty much all the time. I can't keep close relationships because of it. A lot of posts on this thread end up sounding like people calling me stupid.