Alas, I have issues with pencils. Fine motor skill problems – they actually caused me to bomb one of the WAIS subtests at the 1% percentile. At least I think that was why.
Keyboards and screens – and online – have been an extension of my body since I was 17 years old. I maxed out my typing speed to 110 wpm which isn’t QUITE at my speed of thought but it’s as close as i can get — and actually as my thinking has slowed down a little at 51, I can ALMOST type in real time sometimes (finally), with less of a cluttering of excess thoughts trying to cram their way out.
Typing solved my stuttering because the rehearsed muscle patterns are WAY more precise than my vocal chords when it comes to speedy delivery and quick turning changes. Closest thing to driving that I get when I touch type.
I often percussively fidget when I do fidget rather fine-motor fidgeting. and textures. rubbing fingers together or molding fingers around corners or tables or across walls.
But that might be tied to music too. Always composing music in my head and that often comes out in my fingers when I’m not typing on a keyboard. Used to obsessively tap under tables in class. rhythms or songs often including my teeth and tongue and whistling through my teeth – hoping nobody would hear.
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edit: what I wrote is not entirely right. I compose music with my body and whatever’s around. Rocking a squeaky chair, i just started doing after finishing that message and had stopped typing for a moment .I start doing something rhythmically and the music starts forming in my head and sometimes I perform it with my fingernails or toes in my shoes. It’s like controlling an invisible instrument that doesn’t exist
I was born at 26 weeks so I suspect it’s related to that somehow. I have percussive strength – and I’ve broken things with my grip – it can be too strong if anything at times.
But writing with pencil or pen at length quickly leads to cramping and pain regardless of grip. I can remember teachers struggling to improve my grip style, trying to get me to try different ways to hold it.
In the end, I had to learn to pay attention to fatigue and stop writing before feeling fatigue for a few moments.
I’d feel something ramping up in the hand parts under tension; not pain yet, not stiffness, more of an aching and I knew to put the pencil down for about 30 seconds and stretch out my hand again so I could continue. But it would be shorter each time.
I tried to not make a big fuss about it; but tests where “pencil down” was a sign of “finished” I’d have to figure out clever ways to not put the pencil down while resting the aching parts of my hand.
If I had to guess, I’d say that a tendon is probably attached in slightly the wrong place or some nerve that’s supposed to be myelinated but wasn’t and it “short circuits” at certain hand positions rather quickly.
But I don’t know really. They did diagnose me with cerebral palsy at first but after a year it seemed I didn’t have it so who knows
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