According to ncld.org, dyslexia affects an individual in their ability to read, write, spell and pronounce words in the correct format.
For 71 year old Sinclair Community College Security Guard Dennis Harris, dyslexia hits home, because he has been touched by it his entire life.
“It’s a brain malfunction,” he said. “It doesn’t have anything to do with smartness, it’s a brain malfunction. It’s kind of like a short circuit…. For me, when I was in school, it was kind of like if I looked at a page, it was like ants moving around on the pages. I could never figure out how I could get the words to line up, they’d just be moving around.”
Harris hopes to start a local support group for others who have been affected by dyslexia, whether that’s the individual or family members.
“Society needs to understand the things we deal with and I think it’s important for us to have a support group so we can come in and sit down and share our stories, then again too, our wives and spouses because they deal with it too,” he said.
He said he didn’t find out he had dyslexia until he was 40 years old. Up until then, he thought he simply couldn’t read and would put effort into finding ways to cover it up.
“I had to create different tricks and games, at one point, I had to hide it from people… Some of the stuff is funny, but some of it’s still painful,” Harris said.
When he found out that he was dyslexic, he was asked by the doctor who diagnosed him to speak to a mother and her little girl who was also dyslexic, because he knew what she was going through.
Harris said the mother actually thought the doctor let him read the girl’s files, but found out that Harris simply knew how the little girl was feeling because he had been there himself.
“God spoke to me, he said ‘what she is going through, you’ve already been through,” Harris said. “Then he said ‘this is why you went through everything that you went through. In order for you to be of help, in order for you to be of service, this is why you went through what you went through. This is why.’ This is why I do what I do… This is why I’m here.”
He now makes an effort to inform society of what dyslexics go through.
“I just want them to know that there are other people who are still dealing with this, I’ve been trying to enlighten society about what this is for 30 years,” he said. “Society still doesn’t understand what we deal with on an everyday basis.”
To find out more information or if anyone is interested in joining the support group, visit his website at dyslexiaspeaks.com or contact him at 937-278-6840.