I’ve reached the stage of being happy to be odd. Of course it still kicks me in the pants sometimes but .....whispers.... I know I see things others don’t see, small things, I can smell humbug, I know my feelings and love runs deeper than others, it’s taken a long time to realise these things are special, but they are.....I’m a listener. X
Bravo! I agree entirely with everything you say.....I think everyone is a bit odd to be honest it's just how honest we choose to be about it :) I too am joyful about things and care less and less about it as time goes on and just have moved away from those who made me feel there was something wrong/childish with it. Embrace your joy and your odd...it's integral to your gift. I love your posts and find them very grounding and reassuring :)
This is is a fantastic post. Embracing what you are is really tough, and the more you do this, the more impressed I am with your particular flavour of oddness ❤️❤️❤️ The authentic voice is empowering and freeing and it will make you stronger. Be what makes you happy always, Wendy, never worry about the other people. Be you and be your happiest, most authentic self ❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️
This is the loveliest thing I have read in a while. It took me a while to accept myself and own it and it’s something I try to teach my students daily. Thank you for your words.
Thank you. It makes me think back to my life. And that’s helpful. As far as I can see - and I’ve never met you- you don’t seem odd. You’re honest and creative in imaginative ways. Xx
I was reading somewhere about a fourfold increase in the number of adults seeking ADHD diagnosis since 2020. Has the raising of awareness risked pathologising and monetising what were once everyday differences and struggles to fit in? Why do we all have to become square pegs? Does the seeking of a label help the understanding of these conditions or help pin point where the problems really lie.
Education, our society and the environment are involved in the increase. What are we doing to our environment that affects developing brains, what as well as alcohol and nicotine should not be filtering through a mother’s blood to babies in embryo. There definitely is a problem with food additives and an environment where kids no longer go outside to play. I was involved with children, class teacher of primary, from the 1960s, when of course, there were kids with all sorts of differences and different learning attitudes. The ADHD and Autistic diagnosis was unknown, usually there were just kids who couldn’t sit still or keep their attention on one thing, later in the 70s and 80s we devoured the growing material about learning styles, different types of intelligence, and in the 90s use of those terms together with dyslexia became far more frequent, especially it must be said, with middle class parents. Suddenly those pupils were 10% in every classroom. Back in the 60s I was the teacher who stood out supporting the cause of these kids, loving them and their creativity, their antagonism to conformity and I left teaching because fighting for them was driving me mad. There’s nothing ‘wrong’ with us. We are different. I accept the label of dyslexic for myself, no one diagnosed me or awarded me the label, but I did not read at all fluently until after age 11, I have a chronic short term memory and just cannot remember how words are spelt, phonics were only a hindrance. In all my schools I’ve been the one to turn to for ‘alternative’ thinking, the ‘out of the box’ stuff. My brain is different, I do not easily make things ‘automatic’. I never developed an ‘automatic driver’ so that activity, taking charge of a car on frightening roads, so necessary in today’s world became exhausting. All this was a great disadvantage to a a pupil who scored high on IQ tests and was super good at mental arithmetic, at ‘mathematical thinking’ but not rote learning, I could not learn multiplication tables. Society does not like poor spellers. Word retrieval under stress had me running and hiding and getting so angry. In the 90s, I followed up on my interest with Open University courses , read widely about these ‘differences’. I taught really bright kids with the same problems, Newport had a great Educational Service at that time, I taught 1 to 1, ages 6 to 16. Also adults who had erected barriers to learning, people on the way to failing or already failed, so good at doing what I had done all my life, hiding my difficulties, but finding other ways to succeed where I could, for some phonics worked, for some it didn’t. Our education system is not good at being flexible, working at an individual level rather than pouring in knowledge from the top. One size definitely does not fit all. Does it help to have a label? As always, the answer is not simple, for some it helps for others not. I have known personally very clever people who left school very early, they clearly were/are what is now termed autistic, left school because they could neither fit in or be helped to learn, school a waste of time, but who went on to survive in business. We all probably know of people who have done that. I also know personally of people with autism, totally let down by society, whose ends have been tragic. I have stated a few times on social media that I am reducing the time I spend there. The expectations of society still get to me, comparing myself to others and feeling a failure. I will never write a Substack of my own. Sometimes I feel that too much is being ‘shared’, some lines are being crossed, it’s easy to get sucked in. Are there things that should remain private property? It’s ironic that I, in old age, take pleasure in language, the area that society made so difficult for me and yet I admit it is social media that has made me realise that I do sometimes have ‘something to say’ and enjoy saying it. Technology has made this possible for me. Perhaps the onus is on us the get to know how to use social media for our own benefit. I applaud how it is shining a light into dark hidden areas. Always more questions than answers. One day I hope ‘education’ and our society, all our old-fashioned -behind -the -times institutions, will catch up.
I love “joyful” it is not a word I use much or maybe even do much. And I shall try today. I want to clap my hands at something ( I do make noises over food - love food!!). X
I’ve reached the stage of being happy to be odd. Of course it still kicks me in the pants sometimes but .....whispers.... I know I see things others don’t see, small things, I can smell humbug, I know my feelings and love runs deeper than others, it’s taken a long time to realise these things are special, but they are.....I’m a listener. X
You are a true creative Elaine x
Bravo! I agree entirely with everything you say.....I think everyone is a bit odd to be honest it's just how honest we choose to be about it :) I too am joyful about things and care less and less about it as time goes on and just have moved away from those who made me feel there was something wrong/childish with it. Embrace your joy and your odd...it's integral to your gift. I love your posts and find them very grounding and reassuring :)
Thank you so much Rachel x
This is is a fantastic post. Embracing what you are is really tough, and the more you do this, the more impressed I am with your particular flavour of oddness ❤️❤️❤️ The authentic voice is empowering and freeing and it will make you stronger. Be what makes you happy always, Wendy, never worry about the other people. Be you and be your happiest, most authentic self ❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️
Thank you xxx
What a joy this was to read.
Thank you x
Viva la oddness!
I seriously couldn’t think of anything more tedious than being average.
👏👏👏
Yes!
I cannot adequately express how much I love this, Wendy.
Thank you so much!
Greetings from a fellow oddity! I can relate so much to what you say.
Oddities unite!
Love this, Wendy. I salute 🫡 you as a fellow “odd” !
Thank you x
This is the loveliest thing I have read in a while. It took me a while to accept myself and own it and it’s something I try to teach my students daily. Thank you for your words.
Your students are in good hands x
Hello from a fellow oddbod who read this with a sense of relief that I'm not alone. x
This makes me happy x
I’ve always felt like that too. Like you, now I embrace it.I am who I am, and I have found my tribe. Here’s to the strength of weirdness!!! 🤗
All power to weirdness!
Thank you. It makes me think back to my life. And that’s helpful. As far as I can see - and I’ve never met you- you don’t seem odd. You’re honest and creative in imaginative ways. Xx
maybe I'm just good at keeping a li on the odd lol Thanks Marg xx
Maybe. Xx
Sorry- not maybe. Thanks for your honesty. X
This post is lovely. I am odd too. Let's all be odd together.
odd bods unite x
From one oddbod to another, I can certainly relate to the first sentence of this post.
Thanks Harvey
So much to say about being odd.
I was reading somewhere about a fourfold increase in the number of adults seeking ADHD diagnosis since 2020. Has the raising of awareness risked pathologising and monetising what were once everyday differences and struggles to fit in? Why do we all have to become square pegs? Does the seeking of a label help the understanding of these conditions or help pin point where the problems really lie.
Education, our society and the environment are involved in the increase. What are we doing to our environment that affects developing brains, what as well as alcohol and nicotine should not be filtering through a mother’s blood to babies in embryo. There definitely is a problem with food additives and an environment where kids no longer go outside to play. I was involved with children, class teacher of primary, from the 1960s, when of course, there were kids with all sorts of differences and different learning attitudes. The ADHD and Autistic diagnosis was unknown, usually there were just kids who couldn’t sit still or keep their attention on one thing, later in the 70s and 80s we devoured the growing material about learning styles, different types of intelligence, and in the 90s use of those terms together with dyslexia became far more frequent, especially it must be said, with middle class parents. Suddenly those pupils were 10% in every classroom. Back in the 60s I was the teacher who stood out supporting the cause of these kids, loving them and their creativity, their antagonism to conformity and I left teaching because fighting for them was driving me mad. There’s nothing ‘wrong’ with us. We are different. I accept the label of dyslexic for myself, no one diagnosed me or awarded me the label, but I did not read at all fluently until after age 11, I have a chronic short term memory and just cannot remember how words are spelt, phonics were only a hindrance. In all my schools I’ve been the one to turn to for ‘alternative’ thinking, the ‘out of the box’ stuff. My brain is different, I do not easily make things ‘automatic’. I never developed an ‘automatic driver’ so that activity, taking charge of a car on frightening roads, so necessary in today’s world became exhausting. All this was a great disadvantage to a a pupil who scored high on IQ tests and was super good at mental arithmetic, at ‘mathematical thinking’ but not rote learning, I could not learn multiplication tables. Society does not like poor spellers. Word retrieval under stress had me running and hiding and getting so angry. In the 90s, I followed up on my interest with Open University courses , read widely about these ‘differences’. I taught really bright kids with the same problems, Newport had a great Educational Service at that time, I taught 1 to 1, ages 6 to 16. Also adults who had erected barriers to learning, people on the way to failing or already failed, so good at doing what I had done all my life, hiding my difficulties, but finding other ways to succeed where I could, for some phonics worked, for some it didn’t. Our education system is not good at being flexible, working at an individual level rather than pouring in knowledge from the top. One size definitely does not fit all. Does it help to have a label? As always, the answer is not simple, for some it helps for others not. I have known personally very clever people who left school very early, they clearly were/are what is now termed autistic, left school because they could neither fit in or be helped to learn, school a waste of time, but who went on to survive in business. We all probably know of people who have done that. I also know personally of people with autism, totally let down by society, whose ends have been tragic. I have stated a few times on social media that I am reducing the time I spend there. The expectations of society still get to me, comparing myself to others and feeling a failure. I will never write a Substack of my own. Sometimes I feel that too much is being ‘shared’, some lines are being crossed, it’s easy to get sucked in. Are there things that should remain private property? It’s ironic that I, in old age, take pleasure in language, the area that society made so difficult for me and yet I admit it is social media that has made me realise that I do sometimes have ‘something to say’ and enjoy saying it. Technology has made this possible for me. Perhaps the onus is on us the get to know how to use social media for our own benefit. I applaud how it is shining a light into dark hidden areas. Always more questions than answers. One day I hope ‘education’ and our society, all our old-fashioned -behind -the -times institutions, will catch up.
I love “joyful” it is not a word I use much or maybe even do much. And I shall try today. I want to clap my hands at something ( I do make noises over food - love food!!). X