Lesson 2- Believe in Your Self

As a child I had great difficulty learning to read.  Many of my teachers believed I had a mild form of retardation. From as early as I can remember I was in learning disability classes. My mom worked very hard to get me up to main stream level, and sat countless hours trying to teach me to read; to no avail.  By the time I was in ninth grade, my learning disability class was reading at or below a 5th grade level.  I remember in some reading sessions we were actually reading ‘Dick and Jane’ stories.

I remember at this time become increasing depressed and frustrated.  In my mind I knew I was smart, but with all the learning disability courses I was in, I felt stupid.  I finally made up my mind one day, that I would learn to read and write, and at the main stream level (9th grade).  I announced to my English teacher at the time that I would like some 9th grade reading material to take home, because I’d like to work on getting myself up to the same level as most the students my age.  My teacher laughed at me, and advised that at this late stage of the game if I could not read or write, it was not likely that I ever would.

I was undeterred, and brought all the reading materials home.  Soon after though, I became very frustrated, as I truly could not understand what I was seeing.  A few months later my family went through some major upheavals, as my parent headed toward divorced.  Shortly thereafter we moved in with my Grandma in New York (we had previously been living in Virginia).  My Grandma, who had always had faith and believed in me, got me an audition at the school of performing arts.  The last auditions for that year had actually past, but being as determined as my grandma was, she would not take no for an answer.  She showed up at the schools principal’s office every day for a week, until he related and gave me an audition.

I auditioned on my violin and made it into La Guardia H.S. of the Performing Arts for the 10 grade (two months into that semester).  Now came the interesting part.  After about a week or so in the new school, my English teacher noticed that I couldn’t keep up.  He advised me that in the 1st assignment he gave me, I couldn’t even construct a proper paragraph, and he was going to send me for some further testing.  I was very nervous at hearing this, thinking that after all this hard work I was going to be booted out of this awesome high school. He assured me though, that once a student makes it into the school, the school does everything it can to help that students become their best.

They sent me for a number of academic, psychological, and mathematical tests. After which time it was finally revealed to me that I had dyslexia. The school then hired me a tutor that worked with me every day during lunch (& sometimes after school). Within a year of hard work, and focused determination, I worked my way into all main stream courses in less than a year. Not only that, but due to the wonderful tutors and teaches of this school and all their extra help, I got A’s in English every year after.  Without the belief in myself, as well as the encouragement and belief in me by the tutors, teachers and my grandma; I do not think I would have succeeded.


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