Do you suffer from having two lefts?

My girlfriend has problems with her lefts and her rights.
Already since she was a young girl.
That is why a teacher, I believe, her driving tutor she just added told her to trade her left in for an onion and her right for a garlic.
Didn’t help much though; now she mixes up her onions and garlics…

I do things with both hands. I bat right, golf left, throw right, shoot basketball left, write right, play guitar left. It just comes natural to use both, so I don’t have any problem turning left or right.

I don’t have an issue with this, but a close friend of mine, a very intelligent woman who is quite athletic and also an orthopedic surgeon, had this problem. She’s much better at it now, but always make sure the nurses identify the proper limb.

I can swing a baseball bat or golf club either left or rght. Makes me wonder what kind of mixed messages I must have gotten as a kid.

I can also swing my trunk either way.

I’ve never heard of this. Maybe it is a neurological condition or type (?) just as some people have trouble with coordination (seen in handwriting, etc.).

I do remember that when I was a little kid, it took me ages to understand why my right wasn’t always everyone else’s right. (Theory of mind).

I have two friends with this problem. I just don’t get it.

@JLeslie I have two cousins that tried to drive to our house for Thanksgiving one year. They drove out their street, got to the turn to take for the drive, and turned in the wrong direction. They drove for hours before they figured it out. No sense of direction at all.

As something of a knowitall, I believe I am always right . (humour?)

I’ve heard of this, but never had the problem myself. My brother did when he was younger (although I think it was a matter of mixing both directions), but not anymore. Although sometimes I do get east and west confused with regard to roads (but never north and south). But I think a lot of that has to do with freeway onramps and their somewhat counter-intuitive orientations.

I doubt it’s linguistic—both “left” and “right” are words that have other very different meanings (“past tense of leave” and “correct”). I wonder if maybe “right” is easier to grasp just because most people are right-handed and it is seen as the “default”. But then again, left is often first and associated with the number 1, so that seems more immediately obvious to me.

So in other words, I have no idea :)

Left handed right brained blonde here. Half brilliant, half completely ditzy. I manage my disabilities well.lol

@Adirondackwannabe Both of my friends have given me directions that caused me to go the wrong way trying to get to their house. I didn’t drive too far out of my way because I had a vague idea of where their house was and questioned the turn as I was doing it. They also will go the wrong way when I am with them and say left or right. After a while I put it all together that they suck with direction in general. One is from my college days, we are still close friends. The other is a recent friend who I met about two years ago.

Baffles me. Both are smart women.

I wonder if women have this problem more than men. I once read something about women not being as good with direction and spatial abilities, but then the article pointed out in places like Alaska there is no difference between the genders. That there is some sort of socialization going on where women are expected to not be as good as men and so many women don’t develop the skill. The article was about America I guess. It goes hand in hand with women not being expected to do as well in math I guess? I think that is all part of the same part of the brain maybe. Just hypothesizing. It was an old study, I read it probably 30 years ago. I would think now girls are expected to do math as well as boys.

@JLeslie I don’t think it’s gender based. I think it’s how you’re raised. I was in the woods hunting at a fairly young age. I noticed something the other day. I always know where the sun is what ever the time. I wonder if that has anything to do with it.

I have a friend who cannot figure out her lefts and rights while driving. When I am in the passenger seat I have to give directions by saying “take a Melissa” (her, on the left) or “take a Supacase” for a right.

@JLeslie: I think that those abilities might be gender based only with a certain socialization. My dad comes from a bookish subculture where men are not supposed to have spatial or mechanical skills. And so he has almost none.

@JLeslie Actually I am great with direction. I can drive somewhere I have never been and figure out if the curve of the road is taking me east or west or north or south. I don’t even know how I do it. Well I kind of do. I unconsciously seem to know where the sun should be at a certain time of day. At least that is my theory. It would also explain why I feel lost driving at night.
It is just the words left and right. If I study the road before I leave, I can remember if I have to take a left or right and will do it fine. It’s mostly the last minute direction of left that always ends up having to be repeated to me.

Like my gps. It will say left and I have to look at the map because I’m not sure.
But if I do hear it in spanish I am fine. I don’t pause, or start to go right before realizing I made an error in direction.

@Pandora I was thinking the same thing. If you know where the sun is and the time, you can pretty much plot your course. I think that’s the key.

@bookish1 @Adirondackwannabe I agree. I’m a girl and I am the GPS as my husband says. I also was a math person.

@JLeslie It is the sun. I didn’t realize it til now.

I do sometimes look to the sun when I want to orient myself, but mostly I am always aware of which way I am facing if I need to be. If I am responsible for direction I just keep track of it even on a cloudy day or at night. Subway travels south go up the stairs the stars twist once and then when you get a above groung you need to know which direction to walk (unless you are familiar with the landmarks). On the east coast of FL we are usually very aware of where the ocean is pretty much all the time. But, I also make the effort to look at a map, nit to just draw it in my head as I learn where I am. Actually look at a map, big map, not just some little GPS screen, with a birdseye view orients you. You know the general direction and whe sone landmakrks are.

@JLeslie I do the same. My husband always thinks its weird that I look at a map on my computer first before using the GPS. I do it in case the Gps isn’t up to date or a road is closed that it didn’t anticipate. I won’t mess with it while I’m driving.
My Gps one time ended up taking me 15 miles out of my way because several exits on the road was closed for construction and since it was set for hwy driving, it kept asking me to take the next exit but they were all closed and then it told me to drive pass some exits I could’ve taken. It was trying to get me to another major hwy that would cross it and then I could shoot back down. Really made me nervous since I was low on gas, and not a gas station in sight.

@Pandora Yeah, GPS can be great and it can be awful. Just blindly dollowing a GPS I will never understand. It doesn’t know where the ghetto is, and as you explianed it often doesn’t know about exit closures and new exit ramps.

Oh yes. It’s actually gotten so bad with me and my fiancé that we now have new terms for right and left: “left” and “true left.”

I’ve never had this problem, but here is a… um… handy way to quickly recognize the difference:

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-_4njEfbSAKY/TrD8v-1wJCI/AAAAAAAAAFA/e8c786YXEO4/s1600/hand-forms-l4.jpg

I am one of those people who have issues with lefts and rights. It seems to happen much more when I am told to go right though. I am somewhat ambidextrous too. If I am told to go in a certain direction, I usually have to wiggle my fingers and/or look at them (especially if it’s right vs left). I don’t know why. It makes me feel stupid at times, which I know I am not. My partner has grown accustomed to it though – she’ll point as she tells me.

@glacial That’s Brilliant!

I wonder if this is opposite for people who are left handed.
My guess is that because the majority of people are right handed predominantly. The dominant side will naturally have the faster reflex of understanding.
I have noticed something similar in regards to dominance in direction. I have a very keen sense of direction. I have lived on the East coast for quite sometime. So my sense of direction of which way to turn to get to the coast is natural and just takes over.
When I travel to the west coast, I find myself taking a wrong exit because of the reference of the direction I need to take to go to or away from the coast.

It’s one of the effects of dyscalculia. I mix up cardinal directions and right vs. left all the time. It’s not predictable, either. I plainly know which way is right and which is left, but it’s like there’s a part of my brain that isn’t communicating the intent effectively. It’s usually when I’m being spoken to – so perhaps something between the part of my brain that receives audio input and the part that processes the thought and action. I don’t have much of a problem reading written instructions and understanding them.

I have called it “The getting-lost gene” and have suffered all my life. There have been times when I have had to drive over the concrete divide on a highway. My mother had it and often had to do dry runs as she got older, in order to lower her anxiety about getting from A to B.

That is not related to knowing the difference between right and left.

@Seek_Kolinahr @Plucky You are not alone. It does seem to happen when being told to turn left. Although I have noticed that on some roads with left exit ramps that turn and go right, it really throws off my sense of direction till I am on a straight road again. Yet it doesn’t seem to do so going the other way. I am pretty good in math though. Well up to algebra. Geometry killed me.
@blueiiznh Interesting theory. I also live on the east. Wonder if there is a connection to that.
Good point about left hand people. I wonder if they do it too.

@Seek_Kolinahr I am the same way…it is when I hear the direction. I am fine if I’m reading directions or signs. Interesting.