I feel insecure about my intelligence

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I come off as mentally ret*d and stupid and I feel stupid because of head injuries. This tuesday I'm taking a battery of cognitive tests, including an IQ test, as well as a brain scan, and I worry that I'll come up as mentally ret*d

Even on WP many times I post stupid comments and threads that when I look back I think "was I drunk when I posted this". Combined with issues reading and constant dizziness I feel stupid and unable to feel like my brain works properly compared to how it used to

You’re pretty smart. You don’t have any problem with your intelligence.

Hugs salad. You come across as very smart and you're extremely knowledgeable about world history and international politics. I find your posts, your themes, and your writing style all very intelligent. It's also interesting to see you learn more about human behaviour and psychology as you get to know your strengths and challenges in that regard. You certainly seem to be doing OK, but I understand how it feels behind the scenes.

I also have an acquired brain injury. Actually two. Mine are from suffering a major stroke in 2015 and a less damaging one in December 2020. After my big stroke I couldn't read very well. I lost a lot of my speech and my higher order thinking. I felt very frustrated because I couldn't articulate the way I wanted. After this recent stroke in December my brain shut down in terms of intellectual discourse. I just can't handle the stimulation of deep conversations, stress, or academic diatribe. It feels like my brain turned to baby food, or mush. I can string together some nice sentences in my posts but in real life my brain is very tired, and can't be arsed to think very hard. It's hard for people to understand or appreciate that I'm suffering because I seem the same as always.

I hope your tests go OK and you find out the extent of the damage. Neuropsych tests are actually pretty fun, much like playing video games. I think you'll get some answers and a referral to SLP, OT, or a Psych who can help.

You don't have any reason to feel insecure about your intelligence, but I do understand what you're getting at. I do a lot of silky things then regret them later when my mind has had a while to think better of it. We all make poor judgements now and then, and this frustrates me because I know I can do better. But I can assure you that you are very mature and well read for your age. But like most of us, very introspective and self-critical.

According to everyone im just a stupid dumb "muscle head". Thats what I was just called right now at a party. I was told that im brash, tough and too stupid to resolve things normally. For context the party was at the park. While at the party I noticed a young man, a shorter man probably 19, push a girl down her skateboard and start laughing without apologizing. Infuriated I started yelling obscenities out loud at the guy to apologize to the girl or there would be consequences. I must have been loud and everyone at the party stopped what they were doing and began to stare at me and whisper among themselves since without realizing I was causing a scene. When the teen began to smirk and continue laughing without apologizing to the girl I walked up to him, grabbed him by the collar, and forcefully told him to apologize. Thats when several people got involved and pulled me away, and everyone said I embarrassed them and that I ruined a perfectly civil occasion with "brutish incivility". I was told im a muscle head that isn't fit to mingle with upper class decent folk and that im just as violent as my people are (they knew I was Palestinian since my white friend who invited me told them im Palestinian)

afterwards I felt so hurt and like I didn't belong. being at the party with these distinguished white folks who are so posh, smart and civilized I felt like a total outsider being the idiot with slurred speech, memory issues and nothing intellectual to talk about. I wish I had resolved the incident with the guy pushing the girl down the skateboard without being so aggressive

That example shows that you need to learn impulse control, not that you lack intelligence.

Poor impulse control can be from PTSD, ADHD, or your ABI.

You're very smart salad, and the fact you want to address this problem proves it even more.

^^ This

There's a famous scholarly book written by two IQ scientists, Charles Murray and Richard Herstein titled "The Bell Curve" and in that book they show how IQ is implicated in correlations with impulse control, happiness, wealth, income, and happiness indices, meaning people with low IQ tend to lack impulse control, and vice versa. So saying I lack impulse control unfortunately according to the research and literature on intelligence implicates me as low intelligence

I want to address this because I dont want to be some stupid dumb muscle headed idiot, not for me nor my fiancee. I feel so angry at myself for not being smarter and sharper. At best all I possess in my arsenal of abilities, repertoire of traits, is plain brute headed grit and hard work, something any dumb chump can do. I want to be refined and intelligent like everyone around me is. My fiancee double majored in Biochemistry and Statistics, is completing her Masters as I speak, and is so intelligent. I feel so stupid compared to her, and at this party being told im just a stupid muscle head hurts because I wish it wasn't true but it feels hard to deny it

Ironically accurately critically evaluating an IQ paper is in indicator of high intelligence

I mean I only quoted the book sentence. The book literally said that IQ is positively correlated with impulse control. That isn't critical evaluation more than basic recall.

I have poor impulse control. Are you calling me stupid?!

Wanna fight??

You're a genius. Even the number of books you plan to read this year is far more than most people read in a lifetime. I actually wish I was half as intelligent as you.....

Secret: I'm not all that smart, salad. I have isolated interests and I studied / taught niche specialist topics, but my overall breadth of knowledge is below average. I don't know much about the world at all because I live in my head.

I only scored 25th percentile for Verbal-Linguistic IQ and 5th percentile for Non-Verbal.

You likely wouldn't want to fight me, though.

You seem very intelligent to me.

I always thought you were smart from the way you talk and your deep philosophical expatiations on different topics. Even if you dont have the knowledge to win a jeopardy contest that doesn't mean anything, since most general knowledge is junk knowledge anyways

I never turn down fights, so be careful awakening the sleeping giant from his ring

My fists are rated E for everyone

I studied and taught Philosophy, so that explains your impression lol

I definitely couldn't win Jeopardy.

You think you aren't smart, but it depends how we define smart. You know a lot that I don't know. I likely know a lot that you don't know. Then there's your finacée who could take us both out. Cockney Rebel is brilliant with History and the life cycle of peas.

It's all about perspective.