I wonder at the extent of people suddenly being cut off from this forum as a result of their illness; there must be quite a range of disablments that can do it. I was just reading about an author who woke to find that words and letters no longer made sense to him at all (a result of a stroke, but could also happen from a lesion). Strangely enough he could still write despite not being able to read what he had written. Anybody on here found themselves transiently affected by word blindness or dyslexia as a result of MS?
I misread things more often than I used to, even though I’m not conscious of any visual impairment beyond occasional colour distortion.
I ascribe it more to fatigue. It’s almost as if, at a certain point, my brain just makes best guesses at words, and gives up trying to understand them properly. I find I mistake words for others that look similar - but often have completely different meanings!
I read quite fast, so I don’t think I scan individual letters, but rely on overall shape, and the context, to tell me what the word must be.
I would say it’s the context monitoring that has gone wrong on these occasions. If I’m not concentrating as effectively on the subject, there is less indication of what I’d expect the word to be.
A similar thing happens with writing. At a certain point, I start spelling things phonetically, even though I still know the correct spelling, if that makes sense. It’s as if my brain decided not to bother with the whole job, but took a shortcut.
Because these things don’t happen all the time, I conclude they’re fatigue-related, and not due to permanent damage.
Tina
I was diagnosed with ms about 18 months ago, and i was diagnosed with dyslexia about 2 years prior to that. Looking back i am wondering whether instead of dyslexia if it was the onset of cognitive changes due to ms. Or maybe it is dyslexia that was triggered by an ms lesion. However i am convinced i had the signs of dyslexia back in my schooling days but my family disagree. On diagnosis of ms i did ask if dyslexia was any way related yet they said no. I have considered starting a post on this so i appreciate your questions and would like to hear what others say. I have received software from access to work which has helped. The thing i find most useful has been the software that reads whats on the screen, or what i am typing. It does mean i have to wear headphones in the office but it is a great help and saves much time. (and i can ignore people and blame the headphones on why i didnt hear them) Otherwise i could read a page a million times and i would be none the wiser on the content i have read.
Crikey the software must be good, judging from what you wrote!
ha ha thanks, it is good, yet i cant think for the life of me what its called! H
So is it also with you a case of being able to write whilst not being able to read what you or someone else has written? Or can you pronounce text as you read but the meaning doesnt come through unless you hear it?
My reading is slow, and then i have no idea what ive read so have to read it over and over for me to understand. So hearing it being read to me makes this loads easier. I am able to write ok, but it all depends on what im writing though. The end product will bef good quality but it takes me ges to finish a writen task. Even writing a greetings card ive learnt its wise for me to write a practice on scrap paper before i commit to the real card. My brain also jumbles things up, for example writing the address on the envolope ive been known to write a mixture of my own postcode and the recipients, i do the same when writing phone numbers etc. Whats interesting though is that family dont believe ive always had these problems so im unsure how long its been happening. I blissfully cant remember. Of course none of this was helped by getting optic neuritis. Ha ha i was in the apple store today dreaming about purchasing the ipad, though i wasnt convinced it had a clear display today but im sure thats down to my pesky optic nerve playing tricks again. H