To today’s youth with an NVLD- If you’re having times when you feel that no one believes in you I empathize with you completely. I had those periods too. Fortunately, though I realized this wasn’t true. So in this piece, I will informally explain how there are adults in your life who believe in you and will support you.
MH- When I first met you my self-esteem was probably at my lowest and I made that very clear to you. Fortunately for me, you were the teacher who didn’t let this continue and went out of your way to make sure I believed in myself. It took a lot of dedication, patience, and care as you worked with me 1:1 after school pretty regularly. I truly hadn’t had this experience before.
I was blessed with great teachers who admired my work ethic though given the nature of my NVLD I wasn’t considered a priority to be given the extra push. This being said, working with you 1:1 truly gave me greater academic and personal confidence as I could tell you believed in me and we had an incredible student-teacher relationship.
Also, you were the teacher who was the most interested in my college career, and thought it was awesome that I was attending college near Boston. What I remember the most was being able to tell you in person that I graduated from college. You were so proud. Years later I still look up to you a great deal.
JA- When I first joined the Cross-country team I truly had mixed feelings. I remembered how great you were to me when I had you for Technology class but I thought given the nature of the sport my NVLD and seizure disorder would become too much. I was quickly proven wrong as you became a coach who really connected with me. As a result you supported and cared about me well beyond running. Throughout highschool I greatly needed support as I was going through a lot and knowing you were there truly kept me at ease. What was really special about your support is you were the only one who completely understood the reason for my low self esteem and frustrations as your family had faced similar challenges. This truly was huge for me and it is why you became my go to person for support.
Today you’re a personal friend which is special. I still have all my awards from Cross-Country and I think of you often through my work today. Your wonderful friendship to me also speaks volume about how my strong belief that students with an NVLD and similar disabilities should be in sports . This is because you’re still so incredible to me.
MH and JA- How you both connected with me makes me realize that it shouldn’t be so rare for students with an NVLD and similar disabilities to have great connections with their teachers. Yes it’s true it is harder for us as our social skills are often a weakness however by working together and getting to know each other positive relationships are formed. You two showed me this years ago as there was never a challenge or success story that you two weren’t a part of. So hopefully today’s youth with similar challenges are able to have adults in their life be as incredible as you are to me.
To today’s youth with an NVLD- The truth is you will have adults who will believe in you and will be incredibly supportive of you. It is just harder at times to see as it’s common for the adults to connect more with those who are involved in school activities as it opens up conversation opportunities. .That’s how I came close to Mark as he talked about my running career immediately and gradually added talking about trips we had each taken Through this we learned we had the same interests so it was easy to form a great connection. Whereas running long distances with Jim we learned a great deal about each other. So my advice for next school year is to take advantage of getting extra help from your teachers. Working individually with your teachers truly helps them understand you better and also often leads to strong relationships.
Also, don’t be afraid to join some activities as the faculty and staff love reading about the students and in turn great relationships are often formed. By doing this you will find teachers with similar interests as you. Understand though it just doesn’t happen. So consider taking these two recommendations and you will see you have adults who believe in you and want to support you.
Eileen
Eileen is a Project Social Ambassador and blogger for The NVLD Project. She loves helping others understand they can achieve their goals and dreams through hard work and dedication.
