By Marcia Brown Rubinstien, M.A., IECA (CT)

If you see a client with a diagnosed learning disability who claims to be completely free of co-morbid social, emotional, or behavioral issues, you should close your office and enjoy a happy retirement. Your work is done. However, since most of you reading this article are presumably still working, it’s important to understand the unholy alliance of LD and counterproductive behavior that is both the boon and the bane of a special needs practice.

Dr. Don Dresher, director of the Center for Research on Learning at the University of Kansas, believes that “Learning is an emotional, visceral, affective experience before it’s a cognitive one.“ It comes as no surprise, then, that children, adolescents, and adults with LD show increased risk for co-occurring anxiety, depression, and even suicide. In fact, some psychologists believe that the anxiety of being a different learner can start as early as kindergarten, when teachers, parents, siblings, and peers notice that a child can’t keep up.

Children with LD are often frightened by the differences they notice when comparing themselves to peers who learn typically. Some compensate with severe separation anxiety, some are plagued by nightmares. Others develop school phobia. Many students with LD find ways to deflect attention from their learning issues through impulsive and inappropriate behaviors. Compounded by teasing and frustration, the learning disability becomes the governing force which determines a child’s emotional well-being. By the time children with LD enter middle school—that developmental incubator committed to commonality—they work hard to carefully conceal differences from clothing to cognitio. Those who are not successful in masquerading as typical often adopt extreme presentations of self that indicate their disdain for the norm.

Once thought to be the domain of the stupid or sluggish, learning differences are now recognized empirically as variations in neurobiology that cause brains to process information differently. When the only brains available for exploration were found in cadavers or in jars of formaldehyde, it was difficult to understand the workings of neurological diversity. Today, however, modern science, like Functional MRI and similar technology, has shown us that learning disabilities are direct consequences of atypical neurobiology. Differences in structure affect the brain’s ability to receive, process, store, respond to, and communicate information. New awareness of brain function clarified by modern science has helped us understand that LD is not related to IQ and can affect all levels of cognitive ability.

To understand why therapeutic issues are so often co-morbid with learning disabilities, we must examine the persistent and counterproductive differences that LD can generate across the full range of a child’s coping mechanisms, including expressive and receptive language skills, compensatory behaviors, motivation, and social adaptation.

First, it is important to remember that all humans have uniquely structured brains. The differences among us determine who will be a math wizard, who a gifted orator, who an intuitive empath, and who has a built-in GPS that orchestrates directional genius. These differences are accepted, and even celebrated, when they are positive and productive. However, differences which cause discrepancies or delays between age-appropriate expectations and accomplishments are disdained.

The process for determining whether or not a child has a specific learning disability is part of the problem. Federal guidelines require lengthy and detailed observations by parents, teachers, and diagnostic professionals. Unfortunately, children whose learning issues already predispose them to frustration, exclusion, and bullying, must undergo a lengthy process of prodding, poking, and public scrutiny before they can receive services to remediate exasperating deficits. A group of diagnostic professionals must monitor a child’s pattern of strengths and weaknesses to determine who is eligible for services. Data must demonstrate that the child received appropriate instruction in regular education settings, delivered by qualified personnel.

To complicate matters, everyone’s learning process is unique. Learning disabilities vary in scope and severity from person to person. In endless manifestations, LD affects each person differently across a range of fundamental developmental tasks, such as reading, writing, understanding math, listening, speaking, reasoning, and reading social cues.

Dyslexia serves as a great example of the way learning differences can be a hothouse for the development of co-morbid emotional problems. Most education professionals, even those who do not claim expertise in the field of LD, are familiar with the concept of dyslexia, commonly considered a difficulty with reading. Dyslexia seems easy to understand and observe. In fact, many of us who think we understand dyslexia even joke about it when we inadvertently reverse a letter or misspell a word.

It is unnerving to learn, however, that even experts trained to define and categorize LD have trouble standardizing the description of dyslexia. Some define it simply as a learning disability affecting reading. But when we consider the multiple abilities that must combine to produce fluent reading, we realize that dyslexia is actually an impairment of the ability to interpret spatial relationships or to integrate auditory and visual information. With this in mind, we begin to understand how a child who is frustrated by reading in class might be equally frustrated by interpreting playground rules or peer culture.

Samuel Orton, one of the first researchers to describe the emotional aspects of dyslexia, discovered that dyslexics develop anxiety because of their constant frustration and confusion in school. Some become fearful and avoidant of new events. Unfortunately, avoidance of situations that might highlight their problems—like reading aloud or preparing homework—can be interpreted by schools as laziness or oppositional behavior. This lack of understanding causes the dyslexic to feel frustrated and angry. Unresolved anger can cause depression. Some students with LD-related depression implode privately, but we are all frighteningly aware of what can happen when such a student explodes publicly.

IECs who counsel students with diagnosed learning disabilities must be acutely aware that cognitive difficulties are rarely confined to the classroom. They must take care to understand diagnostic assessments and specific issues in order to make the right match between the student and a recommended school or program.

Whether or not LD is indicated in parent or school reports, it is critical to take a thorough history before considering placement. Learn to ask what behaviors or incidents prompted educators to label a child “unmotivated” or “oppositional.” Be sensitive to the possibility that behavioral disturbances are simply another manifestation of learning difficulty.

To complicate matters even more, some people have a single, isolated learning problem that has minimal impact while others have several overlapping disabilities. When a parent tells you, “She used to have LD in third grade, but that’s over now,” don’t disregard the information. Learning disabilities are lifelong conditions that should be recognized as a factor in the journey of every individual diagnosed.

To make a placement that honors the individual and not the disability, IECs must remember that the appropriate school or program will recognize a student’s deficits as well as his or her assets, will encourage self-advocacy, will support a positive self-concept, and will anticipate problems before they occur. The best environment for a student with LD and therapeutic issues will minimize competition and encourage collaborative learning.

In today’s competitive world, learning differences are living differences. They don’t exist in a cognitive vacuum, and they can’t be encapsulated in an isolated area of the brain. Though the LD/ED combo can be complex and perplexing, it can be solved through the fundamental technique of good educational consultation—one step at a time. Remember, though, that some of your students will skip up that step, while others run and fall. Make sure to keep a first aid kit in your office—stocked amply with both literal and figurative Band-Aids.

Marcia Rubenstein can be reached at [email protected]