Dyslexia is a gift to me

Jesse reads by listening and following along. I am so proud of him for this. Learning to read has been such a hard journey. He is a creative thinker. He is an out-of-the-box kid! He is really funny too. He can't stop moving...EVER! He even walks and talks and screams in his sleep. I wonder at all the complexities going on inside his body and mind. What a miracle! 

I am a teacher and I knew next to nothing about dyslexia. I thought it was a disability. I thought it was something bad. I could not have been more wrong. We are walking tentatively into this new realm as we have discovered that Jesse is dyslexic. We have not had him officially tested because we are not in a place where we are able to do that. However, based on what I have studied, I have diagnosed him as that. At first, I was hesitant to even read about this. I didn't want to "label" him or give him a sentence that would mark him forever. 

However, after a really hard day of lots of tears from both of us and feeling like we couldn't find what worked for him, I decided I had to step out a little. Being dyslexic and knowing what that is has released him and given him more freedom than ever.  I had to get beyond my own comfort zone to help him unlock this mysterious world. The keys I had in my arsenal were not working. They didn't fit in any of his doors. In fact, I couldn't even really find "doors". He was starting to get discouraged and worried that something was wrong with him.

Then we studied dyslexia and discovered what a gift it is. It's NOT a disability! It's NOT a problem or something wrong with him. It's really quite beautiful. He is different. He has a unique way of thinking and seeing the world that makes learning to read in a phonics based way really difficult. It does not impair his ability to learn though. It increases it. We learned that so many business entrepreneurs and famous creative thinkers have all been dyslexic. Having dyslexia was not the problem.

The problem was me. 

I didn't know how to think outside of my box in order to help him. We were hitting a wall and I kept wondering why he wasn't "getting it". He was trying. He wanted desperately to please me and be like Annie and Toby. Reading looked really fun to him. He set the same goal for 2 years in a row "to become a fast reader like Annie and Toby." I thought it was a problem of laziness. He wasn't applying himself. He didn't seem to care. He knew "A" says "aa", so why when it was in a word with a series of other letters couldn't he remember that? Why did he seem to haphazardly guess at each word? I discovered he was a really good guesser too and so it was confusing why he could "read" it sometimes and sometimes he had no clue.  So I kept trying to squeeze him into a box that was made for someone else. 

Jesse was made to fly! A box cannot contain him. This is exhilarating and terrifying to me. On the one hand to have a child who has the potential to FLY is amazing! On the other hand, it means I have to let him go. It means I have to launch him off of high cliffs to allow him to develop those muscles. It means I have to stay on the ground and encourage him to become all he was intended to be. It means releasing him to a whole new world that has dangers and wonders I cannot control.

If I am honest, I saw this in him from birth almost. He began walking at 9 months. He fell down the stairs more times than I want to admit, but came up without a scratch. He has been drawn to different things from a young age. In fact, the "bad guys" always seemed cooler to him, causing me to quake inwardly and pray desperately, "Lord, may Jesse hate what is evil and cling to what is good." I saw an inner struggle within him. I saw HUGE potential in him to be a leader and knew that both good and evil would fight for him. He wasn't super bothered by sin. He wanted to experience life in the front row! To my cautious self, I wanted to hide him. I wanted to shelter him and protect him from all of this. I tried to keep him contained.

It didn't work.

It only hurt him and me.

I plunged into the world of dyslexia and instead of finding chaos, I have found beauty. It's a confusing world to my orderly self, but I now have eyes to see the beauty of it and instead of trying to contain him, I am joining him in this world. I am helping him unlock this new world. Together, we will walk into this place. Together, we will discover how God made his mind to work. Together, we will learn to love his wings and let him jump off of high cliffs. We will even encourage it. There will be some rough landings ahead, but we will be there to pick him up and help him launch again. 

I am still his mom and his teacher, so he has to learn to adjust to me a little too. What I don't want to do is decrease all of his unique abilities to be like mine. We are learning together! My new word: ACCOMMODATE!

To make fit for; or change to suit a new purpose.

I am learning to:

1. slow down

2. repeat things

3. be encouraging

My prayer is "Lord, show me how to think creatively to accommodate all of our different needs and abilities." 

I am so thankful for dyslexia slowing me down. Helping me re-arrange my priorities and causing me to see differently. What a gift it is to me and to our family!