What is dyslexia?
Dyslexia
Dyslexia is basically where there's a difficulty with literacy skills at the word level (i.e., word reading and/or spelling). In practice, this means some challenges with applying phonological processing skills (which can include phonics and speed of processing) and/or orthographical processing (which includes recalling common letter patterns).
Although there's a long common held belief that dyslexia is about text looking blurry or the letters moving on the page, visual discomfort and disturbances are a separate issue which those with dyslexia may or may not experience.
With the people you've seen who have dyslexia, what kinds of jobs do they do?
It can be helpful to know that having a specific learning difficulty doesn't mean that you can't achieve your goals. Indeed, many people with SpLDs have careers that play to their strengths which might include creativity, lateral thinking, being empathetic, etc. Over the years, I've assessed many artists, architects, entrepreneurs, engineers, vets, headteachers, GPs, A&E consultants, psychiatrists, an international human rights lawyer, a high profile comedian, a GB Olympian and a very famous YouTuber.
Lots of famous people have dyslexia too! These include Steven Spielberg, Walt Disney, Noel Gallagher, Robbie Williams, Agatha Christie, Liz Pichon (Tom Gates author), Dav Pilkey (Captain Underpants author) and Richard Rogers (architect of the Millennium Dome, etc.). Others include Steve Jobs, Richard Branson, Jamie Oliver, space scientist Maggie Aderin-Pocock and Holly Willoughby.