My Story – Part 2

I wondered: Is knowing how to learn and pay attention impossible?

I knew I was not the only parent to face this frustration.

I saw other children learn easily and leave school each day looking happy and carefree. I knew it was

possible for my child.

I was exhausted trying to find solutions, but I knew that somewhere there was an answer.

The pediatrician said she was healthy.

The psychiatrist said she was fine . . . she wasn’t depressed or anxious.

The therapist said she was stressed.  (No surprise there!)  But what could I do to help her.  What was the solution?

Her neurologist told me she couldn’t stay on codeine to control the headaches and that I had to “Do something!”  He seemed to think that this was a new idea.

Years of struggle turned to success by solving one, tiny problem.

It wasn’t until the Fall of her freshman year of high school that we discovered the real problem.

The real problem turned out to be one very tiny processing weakness.

She could not move her eyes from left to right.

That’s right.  The entire cause of years of agony and struggle and hours each night of special learning help was as simple as not being able to move her eyes from left to right across the page!

Who would have guessed?  Not her teachers, not her counselor, not her pediatrician, not her psychiatrist, not her therapist, not her optometrist, not her tutor, not the reading specialist or the neurologist!

We finally found the problem.

It was so simple.

She learned to move her eyes from left to right.

She finished high school in 18 months with all As.  She became an avid reader.  She graduated from film school and enjoys her career in film editing.  She has great self-esteem.  The stress and the frustration have vanished.

She was lucky.  It could have had a very different ending.

We might never have found the real problem.  She might still be struggling.  She could have struggled her entire life.

My daughter and I felt closer than we ever had.  It was as if her life went from black and white to magnificent color.

Since then, I have dedicated my life to identifying and changing the underlying brain processing weaknesses in children.  I have seen frustrated, angry kids become happy, motivated achievers.  I have seen families enjoy a closeness they never felt before.