My biggest fear...

Growing up my biggest fear was talking. I wasn't comfortable with my own voice. To complicate things, learning to read wasn't any picnic either. With all the difficulties I had with my ears while learning to talk, no one could understand me. I found myself constantly repeating myself and not being understood. It was frustrating to say the least. Years and years of speech therapy and it's still something I think about.

Like I said, to compound the issue was learning to read. I was diagnosed with dyslexia at an early age. I excelled at certain things and was literally terrified of others. I had to read slowly and follow along with my finger. I wasn't really comprehending the sentences as much as trying to say the words the best I could. That wasn't even the worst of it... having to read a paragraph aloud!

I didn't have the sad fears as my classmates. I wasn't afraid of bullies or girls at this point, I was simply terrified of words. Reading aloud was probably the most difficult thing I ever had to do. My trick was to try to count ahead and make an educated guess as to when and which paragraph I was going to read. I would "practice" to myself over and over. Search out sounds that I had hard times saying and try and focus on those. When my teacher would look at me, my heart would fall. Here goes nothing I would think. Half my classmates couldn't understand me and the other half who could hear me, listened to me skip words and transpose letters.

When it was all said and done, all I could do was put my head down and relax. Not the boogie man or anyone other character from a horror film could ever scare me as much as having to expose myself like that in front of my classmates.

Not being able to communicate verbally was a huge issue as a child. Not talking was a lot easier than having to repeat myself or being misunderstood. My classmates weren't nearly as mean or cruel as the ones that laughed at me in my head.

Things did get better though...