Dyscalculia -- I finally have an answer!

Dyscalculia -- is basically like dyslexia but with numbers, and a whole lot else.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dyscalculia

I've always had problems with left and right, clockwise and counterclockwise. As an adult, I add and subtract (and multiply) using my fingers. I get lost all the time and use my gps to get directions to places I've been multiple times. I have extreme difficulty remembering names and faces. I've often introduced myself to people only to be told that I already know them. And the biggest one for me: I cannot learn series of physical movements. I tried tae kwon do and went up to the yellow belt, but I had such difficulty with the moves, remembering the steps and understanding right and left. I would go to the class with children because I felt better with my slow rate of learning.

All these things I thought were just quirks. I never considered myself bad at math, I just thought I didn't memorize the times tables. I thought everyone counted on their fingers to add and subtract! I joke about my lack of direction, and I cover up my left/right, clockwise/counterclockwise struggles (I have a hard time calculating time, too). The difficulty with names and faces I can fake pretty well. I refuse to go to aerobics classes or take any class that requires movement steps.

So it all makes sense to me! Not that there's anything I need to do about it or can do about it, but it makes me so happy that these quirks aren't just single things but others have similar groups of struggles.

I've always relied on my strengths to cover up or compensate for these things, and I'll continue to do that. The only thing finding this out is that others have similar issues, and I always thought I was alone.

I have problems with directions. I always go the wrong way.
Even if I try to trick myself I never get it right.
I was giving a ride to a Pdoc and when did my stuff,
he asked if I was left handed and converted to right handed. Yes, I was.
He told me my brain hemispheres were inverted. That was why.
I don't have problem with anything else.

I need to look at my hands to know if it's left or right.
And I get China time messed up all the time.

I like to first say that what most think of as dyslexia is development dyslexia and I use dyslexia for the same, in what follows.

I would say dyslexia is to dyscalculia what manic-depression is to schizophrenia (or the other way around: it is besides the point, though may be a better comparison than I thought, since it could be that the problems causing dyslexia arise earlier in life than for dyscalculia). It could be argued that there are varieties of BP and SZ distinguishable by a different ratio of exogenous to endogenous influence in the onset of the disorder. I suppose there is pretty much a continuum from one variety to the next, but for the sake of argument in this text, I refer to the hypothetical purest forms of endogenous disorders, meaning the most developmental, the most hereditary and unprovoked types of BP and SZ, the classic or typical psychotic disorders.

The point is: it is highly probable that they are different expressions of, and reactions to, the same underlying problem. Low overall expression/reaction (arguably) leads to SZ and higher overall expression/reaction to BP. Simplistic, but essentially it is (again arguably) like this. It is possible that some preference for mathematics over language may mean that, given problems severe enough to make learning either very difficult, one person may focus on mathematics/arithmetic, becoming dyslexic, while another might focus on language, becoming dyscalculic.

The underlying problem is basically one of perception. More specifically, appraisal. If one has difficulty (rote) learning anything with enough precision (as is requirement for learning arbitrary sequences, like times tables, complex movements and reading), dyslexia or dyscalculia may arise.

As I've already mentioned, it could even be that problems with learning of language, before learning any mathematics/arithmetic, is indicative of an earlier onset, which shifts the (compensatory) focus to mathematics, while no apparent problems early on may cause an eventual focus on language (because, says the linguist, language is just more fun, right?).

I would focus on the underlying problem and call both (a specifier of either dyslexia or dyscalculia would be clinically helpful) something like dysreductia, given my assumption that people experiencing these problems have a difficulty preserving detail in memory: they reduce too much. They abstract too much away.

I would go one step further: I think dysreductia (or however you might call it) is a necessary, but not sufficient, prodrome of the purest endogenous, "developmental"/early-onset and most severe psychotic disorders. How much of the psychotic spectrum is difficult to ascertain since dyslexia (and certainly dyscalculia) often goes unnoticed (i.e. the problems are there, but circumstances prevent proper intervention), underestimated and there's quite a lot of controversy about what is actually means.

I am dyslexic and I have difficulty with all things mentioned (including times tables, motor skills, clockwise and counterclockwise, counting, directions; any arbitrary sequence, in space or time).

I am very interested to know: do you also have difficulty with the alphabet (as in knowing the relative order of two, arbitrary, letters)?

Edit:
The hemispheres of the brain are not switched round, but less lateralised: less specialised.

Many psychiatrists have professional self-esteem problems and like to think they know everything about any medical specialty. Psychiatry is not seen as real medicine by many other specialists, as you may know.

Another edit:
I also have difficulties with names and faces. As I look at it, we might be better at gauging emotions on faces, but we abstract away the (persistent) particulars. The same for routine or well-known environments: we stop noticing the things that remain the same and especially details. We experience changes, but might not know what changed. All dysreductia or, in my case, dyslexia. It can escalate from a normal, moderate, form and state to a more severe, manic, state where everything is malabstracted or malreduced and everything blends (far more) together. Everything is transcended, including the self.

The over-reduction in a normal state of being might even lead to mild depression, due to under-stimulation. Maybe even when, severely, manic and unable to find new excitement. Together with any fear, of course.

Icare -- that's really, really interesting! And yes, I do have problems with knowing the relative order of letters. I have to go through the alphabet each time. I thought that was normal. When I alphabetize, I go through the alphabet each time.

And I am a linguist (majored in ancient Greek and Hebrew), always reading and writing. I can read upside down, backwards, I can write with both hands and write from right to left easily. I do get b's and d's mixed up.

Isn't it interesting how people assume that what they experience is the norm?

And is it normal to have to go through the alphabet each time to repeat the alphabet backwards?

From anecdotal evidence: no. I think few of us are in a position to tell from our own experience, though. Being (I think pretty much generally) abnormal like that. Though I doubt it is spectrum-wide.

Interesting that you're also a linguist, having basically similar problems as I.

I never followed any course in historical linguistics, though (maybe one). We had a strict separation between historical and formal/structural/generative linguistics.

However, it does help me remember words (immensely) by putting them into an historical, etymological, context.

It was dyslexia that lead me to do linguistics: I wanted to find some regularity, some context, in all this arbitrary (contentious, in my book, including the lexicon) mess we call language, so I could remember it. It was also dyslexia/"dysreductia" which made me develop theories of how language in the (very) broad sense, arbitrary (largely, yet with some regularity/structure of course) sequences, works together with emotion (I was manic during that time, but I always like to explore uncharted territory).

So psycholinguistics was the logical next step. From there I broadened by horizons to include the study of psychotic disorders, which I believe to be dyslexia/dysreductia severely gone wrong.

Emotions and (sequential) forms. Always look at the outliers/exceptions in some essential ways to study those ways. So I included the autism spectrum disorders which lie very much at the opposite end of a continuum (with regard to emotion and appraisal in perception) which transcends all forms/types of perception, as I see it.

Now I am doing research in everything, given there is not much more than perception, really. With an emphasis on the relations between emotion and form, further on psychotic disorders and further still (formal) thought disorders and dyslexia (in the broad sense: "dysreductia").

I also had problems with b's and d's and other letters, but not anymore. I could write with both hands, but at school they thought (at the time) that this was problematic and that I should choose one or the other. I did and I can't write with my left hand now. Pretty much everything else I can do equally well with both hands, but I prefer to use my left hand (except for writing).

Reading upside down is not at all an issue. I used to read the newspaper my father was reading from the opposite side of the table. He, always the charmer, would say: "Didn't you have dyslexia?" (he never believed I did and gradually begins to accept I am "crazy" and need help, in his words). While it is because, not despite, dyslexia that I can read upside down with ease. Positioning just being rather inessential. It also explains the dysreductic problem with b's and d's. Same with handedness: who cares!?

I'm not a linguist officially, as in a career. I just love languages!

As for handedness, I was always confused because I'd normally try to do some sports in the left-handed way initially.

Much of the greatest work in any scientific or philosophical field has been done by amateurs/non-professionals. Take, for example, Wilhelm Humboldt, Albert Einstein, Gottfried Leibniz, Baruch Spinoza, Charles Darwin.

I also tend to use the left hand first and switch if more convenient or cheaper: guitar, scissors, et cetera.