16 People With Low IQs Are Sharing How Different Their Lives Are, And It's Eye-Opening
Talking about shortcomings is never an easy conversation, especially in a modern world where it could perceived by social media as others leading perfect, flawless lives.
But those tough conversations and testimonials are the most important to listen to. Redditors took to the question, "People with confirmed below-average intelligence, how has your intelligence affected your life experience, and what would you want the world to know about what it's like be you?" and shared their real-life experiences. This is what they had to say:
1."IQ of 87 here. Words just don’t seem to click for me in college. My brain gets saturated after about two hours or so, and I can’t remember anything past that while studying. There’s no chance of studying at the last minute, and it’s weird to be the smartest in the family despite obvious flaws. I seem to have zero ability to think outside the box, but it still seems to happen from time to time, and it’s extremely satisfying when it does. Lastly, my working memory and comprehension are not very good, which is what an IQ test is based on. This means when I’m literally at work at my retail job, I sometimes completely forget what I was doing or where I put an object."
2."I have a low IQ but was never tested for anything else. My parents are actual geniuses; both have poor backgrounds but managed to succeed; all my siblings are smart, too. I had trouble following teachers and other kids in classes; it took way more time and examples to figure something out. I never had the time to do anything else other than study. I don't think I've had friends since kindergarten. I can't talk to people; I have trouble understanding most jokes in a reasonable amount of time. I never understood the deeper meaning of movies, songs, or books — even when somebody explained them to me."
"The thing that screwed me up the most is the 'you can do anything you want if you work hard enough' thing we say to the kids. Because it worked for my parents, they thought it would work for me. And not just them, all motivational speakers, all teachers...I worked 10 times more (literally) than other kids, so I was actually pretty good in high school. I thought that uni would be the same; just by going there and working hard, I would get my degree. What happened was that I couldn't follow courses after the introductory stuff. I somehow passed the first year but was kicked out after the second year because my exam results were so bad. I developed several sleep disorders and several addictions, and I'm in huge debt as a result of my two failed years at uni. I can't even get my drivers license, there too many things on the road to keep track off."
3."I can function relatively normally. However, I'm also fully aware of this deficit and how high my IQ could be. Talking slowly or, getting annoyed because I've asked you to repeat something, or pushing me out of the way when I don't react fast enough...that's just rubbing it in. I can't change how well I process information — believe me, I've asked my doctor about it, and other people have tried before me. I'm stuck where I'm at in this regard, and it's hard to "try harder" when I'm already running at 110% just to keep up with the rest of the world."
4."Everyone in my family was bullied growing up for being 'stupid,' including me. It was hard for me to find friends because of it. My brother was beaten up regularly for it. I couldn't read until fourth grade. Then a teacher told me I'd never do anything with my life. That day, I started spending all my free time learning how to read just to give her and the world the middle finger and prove I could do something with my life. After that, while I got good grades, I was still seen as 'stupid' or 'lazy.' I had to work five times as hard on everything I did just to keep up."
"Is it all bad? No. Having to work extra hard for everything in school has seeped into every part of my life. Now that I have accommodations, I feel like I'm unstoppable. At my college, I'm an honor roll student going into geology, president of the STEM club, founder and president of the board games club, part of the student leadership council, and sometimes the college lets me call bingo numbers at events. I love college.
What do I want people to know about what it's like to be me? It's a lot like a fish being told to climb a tree. I won't be good at everything you're good at, and that's fine. I don't need to be. It doesn't make me less worthy of respect, love, or a good life."
5."I have an IQ in the 70s. I have a great memory for facts, so I did well in grade school and even got into advanced classes, but as an adult, I'm really struggling. I don't learn easily or take instructions well; I can get lost in familiar places. I can't play complex games and get confused by many things, even "normal" things like folding towels. I come across like an airhead, and I can explain in child terms how to do something, and it takes me at least three times every single time — not every time I do something new; I mean literally every time I do something."
"It's very frustrating because I'll say that I'm not smart, and people will say, 'Nooooo, don't say that! You're smart!' But the thing is, I'm not even sad about it. I have other good qualities. I'm funny, I'm pretty, and I'm kind. I'm so sick of people acting like intelligence equals worth when that's not at ALL the case. I'm okay with being slow. Don't pretend I'm not to make me "feel better" because what's going to happen is you're going to expect me to be able to do things as if I'm smarter than I am, and then you'll be frustrated when I don't."
6."I suck at math, hard. Other people excel at it, but other people won't be as good as me at identifying animal species and knowing facts about them. Other people won't be as good at drawing as I am, which takes a plethora of knowledge, such as anatomy and perspective. My autistic cousin can't understand social cues and never went to school because of it, but they can build a vacuum cleaner and run a business at 17. My older sister, who also has ADHD, is currently doing a PhD at only 24, but she has a hard time doing addition and telling time."
"I really do hate the fact that everyone's existence for the majority of their life is summed up in numbers determined by people who don't even know them."
7."Everything I do is out of habit. If I haven't been doing it for years, I won't remember to do it unless I have alarms throughout my day. This really hurts me because I've been trying to learn a language for two years, and at my peak, I think I was studying a few hours a day for six months. I only remember three words for all that effort. I cannot do anything with the logic behind it, either. I could spend an hour looking at a basic algebra question trying to get it, and not understand it a bit. I hate it. I hate not being able to learn. I hate how I always forget things a day after people say it to me 99/100 times. I hate remembering life in tiny fragments. Sometimes, I don't know if I'm dreaming or if this is reality. This was caused by intense seizures my whole life and not breathing at birth."
8."Mine might be one of the biggest causes of my depression. I never feel on par with everyone else. I'm slow to learn things, making it nearly impossible to get a non-basic-level job. It's caused me to make so many 'stupid' mistakes at work. If I weren't such a hard worker and good guy, I would have been let go years ago — this comes from my manager... I get yelled at to 'use my head' when I am positive that is what I just did. It's a hard life, and it's not under my control."
9."Social media is sometimes difficult. It's always really embarrassing when people send me timed snaps. I often had to tell them I couldn't read it, and they'd send it again, and I'd tell them once again. Other times, someone would show me and some others a post or meme on their phone, and they'd pull it away when I was only on the fourth or fifth word. I'd always have to say, 'Wait, I'm a slow reader.' Very active group chats aren't fun, either."
"This one is the only one that makes me genuinely sad: I ended up stopping reading recreationally. I actually really like reading, but it's depressingly difficult. The last book I read for fun was less than 300 pages and took me almost two years."
10."I had a rough beginning in school, but life got better after school. I still have major issues in my visual cortex. Riding a bike through trees with shadows that go light/dark/light/dark quickly seems to hit a reboot button in my brain. I need a minute or so of quiet time before I can ride again. And my music affinity is off the chart. If there is any background music (however quiet), it becomes the foreground in my brain, drowning out my ability to follow conversations."
11."I've always had a flair for art, and that's the only mode by which anyone has ever gotten a glimpse of my mind. I would barely stitch together a sentence or make eye contact. Most of these traits were just ignored, and I went on to believe that this was me."
"I've always had trouble at school. Learning and keeping up with my peers was an absolute challenge. The fact that my older brother was an overachieving local child celebrity who excelled at everything he laid his hands on never helped either. Every year of school, my grades plummeted even lower, and my teachers, peers, and neighboring folk all simply believed that I was 'the other child' among the two."
12."I have well below average processing speed, like, below the 10th percentile. Basically, what this means for me is that it takes me much longer than classmates or coworkers to complete schoolwork or work-related tasks. I can also be quite slow to follow a conversation, and I've always had trouble fitting in and understanding jokes quickly."
13."It takes me longer to figure out puzzles, so playing some games is impossible unless I just google the solution, so most video games just go out of the window. There are also a lot of times when I can’t really think at all, and my brain feels like a computer that’s locked up because it’s trying to process too many things at once. Sometimes it’s only a couple minutes, sometimes it’s like that for a whole day. It’s hard for me to learn new stuff, and usually, when people explain stuff, I’m busy trying to process what they explained to me, so when people say, 'Do you have any questions?' I say, 'No, I can’t think of any right now,' later, I have to ask a question that didn’t occur to me before, and they get frustrated with me. I hate that."
14."Imagine trying at something over and over and over again to only continuously fail where others have put in far less work. While often, because it takes longer to do things, it's disheartening, I've been a pretty hard worker at times. I've gone through periods where I have studied for tests for over two days straight, only to get a grade I didn't want... People with normal intelligence and mental states have no idea how lucky they are, nor will they ever be able to understand what it's like living in the shoes of someone with below-average intelligence. And that's fine because they can't, so don't expect them to."
15."I can learn to do nearly everything to an above-average level; it just takes me longer. It is very hard to comprehend written text and speech at the speed of others (I have to rewind shows or reread frequently to get the full gist of things), but it gets done. I'll just never be the creative innovator or prodigal genius at the top."
16."I often forget how old I am and will frequently 'blink,' suddenly, I am somewhere I don't remember getting to, like my body was on autopilot. A lot of this is because my mind will float somewhere else. I have to reread things five to eight times because the words will slip away from my mind. I became scared to speak up and ask questions because it would usually make no sense to anyone else, and I felt hopeless. I wasn't trying to annoy people by always asking them to repeat stuff. I just couldn't be on the same wavelength. I know people made fun of me because they did it to my face. I got help, but I still feel like I have to prove that I'm not an 'idiot' all the time and work myself to the bone sometimes. I am still scared to speak up, but I am working on it."
Entries have been edited for length and clarity.
