My Dyscalculia Story: Jane McNeice

Academic background and everyday experiences with maths

I was the child who did really well academically, who became the adult who continued to do really well academically. I am currently undertaking my MA in Autism, distinctions at PGCert and a first class honours degree. However, when I reached the age of 7 and we were being taught to tell the time I struggled incredibly. I could not tell the time properly till I was well into my teens. I went from an automatic set 1 maths student (judged by others by my other academic abilities) to a set 3 maths student in 5 years. This resulted in a GCSE grade E maths in 1991, which was and remains a significant outlier to my other qualifications.

I am now a company owner. I get by on the numbers front, but struggle sometimes with creating quotes, and not under-charging or miscounting financial figures. I know I will have done at some point and it will have cost me. I rely heavily on a calculator, and hand as many numbers-based tasks to others that I can. I am a mental health trainer, so managing timings in the training room and putting people into groups can be difficult for me too. Such a basic numbers task but I still struggle.

My greatest fear at the moment is doing my MA research, particularly as I may need to use more quantitative methods for what I wish to undertake. I struggled with the numbers part of my undergraduate degree research in 2006 for the same reason, but I still didn't know I had dyscalculia then. 

Early experiences and first signs of difficulty

I first noticed the challenges at age 7 (1982) when we were learning how to tell the time using little orange plastic clocks in class. All the blue lines of my jotter were wobbly where the tears had fallen and blurred the lines. It made me feel depressed and I was already struggling that year. This just added to it. I never suspected anything until the autism assessor sent me my report in 2021 age 45 which also stated suspected dyscalculia. I had not been supported on many fronts and this explained so much. My lived experience also contradicts the stereotype that all autistic people are good at maths or work in STEM! I know women who were told they could not be autistic because they weren't good enough at maths. I am living proof this is false. 

Diagnosis and understanding

When I received my autism diagnosis I was told I had suspected dyscalculia. It came as no surprise, but I would still like a formal assessment. I learned I am not actually a 'maths dunce' - a label I had often given myself, and my ex-business partner had always made fun of (and took financial advantage of, hence ex-business partner). 

Support, strategies, and learning approaches

As an adult, age 37, I undertook functional skills maths in an attempt to improve my maths ability. It didn't really work as the information did not go into my long-term memory. I cannot remember any of it now. I find something must be my special interest for me to retain the facts around it. An example, I have an exception memory for mental health statistics, because this topic is a special interest. 

Misunderstandings and impact from others

When I was 12, my maths tutor used to give me points for putting my name on the maths test paper. This did not assist my confidence or self-esteem. I was also living with unidentified autism, so that was unsupported also. 

Personal insight and strengths

I did an IQ test as part of the research for a lived experience book I was writing. I learned that I pattern spot 87% faster than others on test. This was always something I couldn't fathom - why I seemed able to recognise patterns, but wasn't good with numbers. Knowing this and the suspected dyscalculia helped with understanding.