Do I have NLD?

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I do not think that NLD is something which give "Aspergian" symptoms, such as lack of eye contact or "obsessive" interests. I think that it is impairment of visual, spatial and motoric skills.

I wonder if I have nonverbal learning disorder (the better name should be "visual-spatial-motor disorder"). Some of my traits:

1. I am mostly a verbal thinker. I think that I have quite poor visual thinking ability. I have some visual thinking, but I do not use it in practical way so much. I have rather poor spatial imaging ability, but I like maps really much, I do not have problems with telling time from a clock, I like "living" colors, I liked video games much (I can make quite "good" films in my head which are about some of them - I have quite good visual thinking in this area), my dreams were rather only visual and colorful (I had once about 20 nights with dreams (rather somewhat long, colorful) one after another when I was 16 (if I remember it well), I rather did nnot get medications to my mental health problems then)
2. I often confused left and right or probably also words such as inside and outside in my childhood, maybe even early adolescence, I confused signs such as "<" and ">", rather even in secondary school
3. I learned how to tie my shoes quite late (when I was about 8 years old, if I remember it good), the father was somewhat "aggressive" and I eventually learned how to do it
4. I was quite poor in physical education, I have troubles with rhythm, I can't swim, I rather can't bond ties and do other relatively simple motoric tasks (but I have rather good handwriting and often like it)
5. I (probably) remember that I had "limited visual memory" during childhood; so I rather do not have eidetic memory or "special ability to visual thinking" which many people with AS can have
6. I often had poor grades in Physics, especially in secondary school, but in Polish language I had always "very good" at the end of the school year. Curiously, I had the lowest grade "1" (the highest is "6" in Polish education system) in the middle of second class in secondary school in Maths, but I had later extra lessons due to my AS diagnosis, I wrote my "mature" exam from Maths at elementary level... perfectly (100%), even in more difficult level I had more than 90% in my "mature" exam when I was 18!

I don´t think, anyone here can answer your question. We are lay people in here, so we can´t diagnose you. You better see a professional about that.

I chose the "yes -- mild" option because there wasn't one for "possibly". As Jensen said, we can't diagnose you here, but from what symptoms you did describe, NLD could be a possibility. Do you have any other symptoms of which you're aware? The general consensus is that, among other tests, the WISC or WAIS IQ test has to have a gap of at least 10 points between your verbal and nonverbal abilities. Distinguishing between NLD and AS is hard: I have a 40 point gap between my verbal (higher) and nonverbal (lower) IQ scores, and I'm diagnosed with AS, so a dissonance between specific cognitive strengths and weaknesses is far from definitive.

I did not make any official VIQ or PIQ tests in my life I want to do it and I think that I should make them. I think that I have AS + mild NLD which additionally limits my occupational abilities.

Startrekker. What is the verbal and nonverbal in the Wais? I was dxéd by that too. Is "nonverbal" the "cartoon"cards too? I fell below normal there as opposed to "reason" and "verbal", which hit the roof. The puzzle went very quick too.

I am not so fast in completing puzzles. I was poor in chess. My father was always better than me. I have logic reasoning and verbatim memory gifts, but my auditory memory may not be so strong. School learning was often really easy to me. But I am not talented in visual-spatial area. I may have planning and organisation problems. Indecisiveness is a problem.

I do not think that problems with planning, organisation, making decisions and complex tasks are NLD. I think that it may be another group of symptoms. It may be a PDD trait. I name it as an "activity disorder", such as hyperactivity, hyperkinetic behaviors and stimming, tics, ADHD, ADD, SCT.

This sounds a lot like me. O_O All of those things you mentioned, I have a hard time with. I don't think I was late with shoe-tying, but I struggled GREATLY with sports. I played baseball once, and I actually got kicked off the team for being the worst player too (not right, I know...). I also have trouble with my visual memory, but I am great at listening with my ears and absorbing information that way as well. I've always wanted to know what the deal is with my poor reading comprehension.

I rather can't play volleyball... I was rather poor in Physical Education. I have also quite poor endurance and strength (maybe it is a sort of sensory intergration disorder?) which was additional difficulty on PE lessons. And I suppose that I may have (even quite severe) case of sluggish cognitive tempo disorder which makes a person slow, "drowsy", "spacey" and prone to daydreaming. I ("pejoratively") named my symptoms as "twitness". It may be a problem in occupatinal area.

I think that the set of symptoms such as written below is an "activity disorder" which may be a subtype of ADHD or something like it (but not a "nonverbal learning disorder"), I do not know what would be the name of it:

- problems with making decisions
- tendency to procrastrination
- difficulties with more complex tasks (such as projects, writing stories)
- problems with organisation
- problems with planning, selecting informations

It is not an attention problem (ADD) or difficulty with ending tasks which are begun.

Sluggish cognitive tempo (SCT) or concentration deficit disorder (CDD) is another "activity disorder" which has symptoms such as:

- sluggishness, making tasks slowly
- some sorth of "drowsiness", being "lethargic"
- being "spacey"
- being prone to daydreaming
- people with it may have tendency to stare, have "lack of energy", be more easily "confusable"

I suppose that I may have quite severe SCT which is additionally harmful to executive and social functioning. I may have also the "syndrome" decribed on the top of the post, but I do not think that I have ADD or troubles with completing tasks.

Hyperkinetic behaviors, tics and stimming appear to be another group of "activity disorders".

Social, emotionl, executive, sensory problems are not NLD for me.

I suppose mild NLD due to some visual-spatial-motor problems which I have. Some of them may be the result of general "dysexecutiveness". But I have relatively weak ability to use visual thinking practically. I quite strongly prefer verbal thinking. I do not think that verbal thinking is not natural for me. I may have subvocalisation in my head "always constantly" and picture thinking may be not present many times.

The preference of verbal thinking is not NLD itself for me. I have AS diagnosis, but rather prefer verbal thinking and may have problems with more practicl use of visual thinking. Why I prefer verbal thinking and I appear to be "verbose" in my head? Why I do not have preference of visual thinking for practical purposes? Maybe if an other person would think like me, he or she would see more "visual thinking" in own head? Despite my "verbosity in head", I liked video and computer games, maps, colors... And fiction literature was rather not interesting for me...

I remember that I probably had problems with graphs about mathematical sets when I was about 8 years old. I remember also problems with counting in columns when I was about 9 - 10. When I was about 7 years old, I might have small problems with spelling. When I was about 6, my beginnings of learning how to write were somewhat difficult, my father might be aggressive. When I was about 9 years old, it was written than I omit about 13-19 (Polish word "kilkanaście", which means something like "about 13 - 19" was used) words when I read. Learning aloud might be not excellent in my case although I have not dyslexia.

I would say that my verbal skills are better than visual-spatial skills, even if I do not have NLD. I do not remember having problems with reading clocks and maps. I have not dyscalculia. I don't think that I can't recognise objects without seeing it.

Having NLD does not mean that someone has to be dyssemic, socially inept. "General picture" of NLD is severely "contaminated" with PDD traits such as lack of eye contact and emotional peculiarities. For me some people with PDD are misdiagnosed with NLD.

I feel that verbal thinking is clearly dominating in my case, I have rather poor spatial imagination and intelligence. But spelling and grammar were really easy to me. I have not eidetic memory.

I suppose that I would have problems with "spatial imagination" tests like Non verbal Reasoning Sample Mock Test NVR-MTP-001 from this page http://www.11plusdiy.co.uk/Resources/Free11Downloads.aspx. I can't count in columns in my head, I have not so good visual imagination to do it.

Fragment from http://www.nldontheweb.org/nldadvancedreading/nldclinicaldescription.html:

Finding similarities between words may be very easy for me. I may wonder why some people have problems in it... Many people with autism can have serious problems with similarities, but for me finding similarities may be really easy.

I also may wonder why spelling is so problematic for some people. My brother had quite serious problems with spelling when he was a child, he was even tested for dyslexia, but was not diagnosed with it. But his IQ appear to be really high, although maybe quite slightly below "gifted" zone.

I have problems in using visual thinking in practice. Especially 3D visual thinking. I may be "disabled" in this area, although my spatial orientation is not so bad (but also not so good to say that I have GPS in head) and I had no problems with reading maps (it is still interesting for me) and clocks. Working with machines appears to be hard for me, maybe because of relatively poor visual thinking, especially in 3D. I may have quite large dissonance between my "verbal" abilities (such as spelling, finding similarities, rote memory for facts) and visual-spatial potential (such as ability to imagine 3D structures in mind, complex visual memory for details). I would say that I have "hyperlogism" - my verbal skills (which were really useful in school) are "overdeveloped" in comparison to my abilities to visualise things in head. I am not totally incapable of visual thinking, but even my 2D imaginations are quite "blurred" and not so detailed.

Data about IQ test (WISC-III) of a boy with NVLD (from http://www.nldline.com/bonny_forrest_asvsnld.htm):

Information 14
Similarities 10
Arithmetic 07
Vocabulary 16
Comprehension 11
Digit Span 10

Picture Completion 08
Coding 02
Picture Arrangement 05
Block Design 01
Object Assembly 08
Symbol Search 08

VC 116
PO 75
FD 93
PS 75
VIQ 110
PIQ 69
FSIQ 88

I had an IQ test that month and the results were:

VIQ 126
PIQ 104
general IQ 117

Information 17
Similarities 15, maybe 16
Arithmetic 18
Vocabulary 15, maybe 16
Comprehension 15, maybe 16
Digit Span 11

Picture Completion probably 09 or 10
Coding 13
Picture Arrangement 08
Block Design 14
Object Assembly 09(?)

The psychologist who did the test with me said something like that that my results are (very) characteristic for... schizoaffective disorder. I asked her if she remember(?) or met so large differences between the "best" subscale (in my case Arithmetic) and the "worst" one (in my case Picture Arrangement) - she did not mention such cases. I asked also about so large difference between VIQ and PIQ - the answer was similar.

In the case of the boy mentioned in http://www.nldline.com/bonny_forrest_asvsnld.htm, Arithmetic was the weakest subscale in VIQ and Block Design was the weakest subscale in PIQ - in my case there was the opposite - Arithmetic was the best of VIQ (but Information was also very good (17)) and Block Design was the best of PIQ (Coding was also quite good in my case (13), in the case of the boy it was also very weak (02)).

Despite that my IQ profile looks somewhat "eneldic" (or at least "hyperlogic") because of evident dominance of VIQ (PIQ is almost 1,5 SD lower) and quite large dominance of Information, Similarities, Comprehension and Vocabulary over Object Assembly and Picture Completion. I do not remember scores for Vocabulary, Comprehension and Similarities exactly, but it is very probably that they all were higher than the gighest result of my PIQ subtest (Block Design - 14).