How clumsy are you?

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Most clumsiness I guess is due the lack of attention not balance. Absent minded bumping into things. Though there is the physical clumsiness too.

I'm certain I have vestibular sensitivities but I've been this way my entire life and no dr has ever really bothered to investigate the cause. I have terrible motion sickness (although I love rollercoasters- not roundy-spinny rides, but coasters) and I struggle with spatial orientation. At my age (37) I assume if it was a serious inner ear thing, something would have happened to me by now. I also experience vestibular disturbances in my sleep (out of body-like experiences) as well as a shrinking sensation. Again, I've been this way my entire life so I'm assuming it's a structural thing or a sensitivity, as opposed to a growth or virus.

Back when I was young (7 maybe) at a midsummer fair thing associated with a heritage society society we were members of, there was a competition of who of the little kids could throw the ball the furthest. My cousins and my sister were all being very competitive and didn't want to go first because that - I went ahead and went first - and threw the ball behind myself. People were so amused by this that the competitive aspect no longer mattered - however I was the only one who got a negative distance.

For clumsiness now - my biggest problem is in carrying mugs and cups. I cannot carry a mug of coffee 10 feet without spilling it. I regularly spill drinks all over myself in ways that people find impressive, because they're not sure how I managed it (neither am I to be truthful). People tend to be amused, but friendly about it. If I start actually being bothered and they notice it they stop commenting on anything.

I also have terrible hand/eye coordination

My clumsiness is very unpredictable. I'll have days that I cannot take a step on stairs without stumbling and almost falling down the stairs, and days where I only have issues with carrying cups and mugs and with drinking and with spilling sitting cups. Certain types of motions I'm not at all clumsy with - others I am clumsy with.

For myself, I'm sure that my clumsiness isn't because of lack of attention - I actively pay attention to what I'm doing, especially when I'm dealing with cups. It's just not enough. It's like no matter what I do it will automatically spill everywhere.

I have much more control of my legs than my arms as a whole though - despite the fact that I do things like paddling. I do think a combination of kayaking and irish step dance has reduced my clumsiness because now I'm much more aware of my body normally, though my arms without a paddle it them still don't move like they're complete in terms of smoothness of movements.

I'd recommend to people wanting to work on this trying participating in single-person activities that increase awareness of your body. It did help me, though I'm still known for having impressive abilities when it comes to certain types of clumsiness

Horribly. I am constantly falling into / onto things. My legs are 90% bruises... And even drinking water is an issue, have the worst coordination ever not spilling it all over me. Thank god for straws. Hehe. But I think it has much to do with attention span, never much mind what I am doing.

For a long time I had a flinch reaction whenever I did something clumsy, because of my abusive parent - he'd get so insulting and nasty about any kind of mistake it was beyond ridiculous. And there was never any such thing as an "accident."

Clumsy enough, sometimes. For instance, last week I was trying to fix my hand osterizer, when my right hand decided to hit the start button. OUCH! My two fingers on my left hand are healing fine, but it hurt bad for a good while. What was I thinking?!

this type of thing has happened to me more times than i can count- walking down the stairs to my shrink's office, my heel missed the top step and i fell down hard upon my tuchas and bounced every other step all the way down to the landing, going "OWOWOWOW!" all the way down. at the bottom, several office doors opened simultaneously, with curious heads craned in my direction as though i were a purple creature with multiple heads or something.

I'm clumsy enough to be usually carrying some sort of injury. Osteoporosis doesn't help with that, but not falling in the first place would be better.

I get the impression form the posts that I'm somewhat less clumsier... But, clumsy enough to feel it in comparison to "average" people. I do clumsy things.

Once I dropped a 5 liter (1.3 gallon) jar of canned cucumbers on the floor that I just wanted to show how big it is.... Guess what had happened...

My hand-eye coordination isn't good, I'm worse with my legs than my hands, though. I'm a terrible dancer, can't move to the rhythm at all.

When I manage to learn new skills at last, chances are I forget them quickly if I don't practice them frequently enough. It makes me sad and frustrated sometimes.

Tuttle wrote:

Awesome. I also am a negative distance thrower. When I was in high school, we used to throw these little footballs into the crowd and I was notorious for nailing people in the face or knocking their drink/food out of their hand (or throwing them backwards onto the field of football players). I either had perfect aim or fatally bad aim, and it's always a toss-up. It became such a joke that the crowd facing me would flinch in unison when I would throw the ball.

And then there are frisbees. Oh, I fear walking past someone who says, "can you toss me that frisbee?" Well, no I can't, apparently. This pisses my dog off too because one of my boys loves frisbees and he gets so frustrated waiting for me to successfully toss one in his direction. Don't get me started on throwing darts. I'm banned from most dart boards and I've always been confused why bars would want drunk people throwing weapons in their establishment. Turns out they're fine with drunk people, just not sober me throwing darts.

There are too many great posts to quote right now but this has been excellent comic relief and a wonderful start to my day.

Cheers!

I am the princess of clumsiness, honestly, I can fall down anywhere for no reason at all, I can fall up stairs, god help me if I try to do anything remotely athletic! It is just not a skill that I have.

For one thing, people insist on throwing objects across the room, and I have always been horrible at it. I just cannot manage to catch things that are thrown at me. Some people think it is hilarious to try to get me to catch because it is funny to them. Its very frustrating to me so I have just stopped trying because it is not entertaining. They know there is no chance I am going to catch it.

The amount of dishes and glasses I have broken due to just dropping them is phenomenal.

I swear I'm not trying to monopolize this thread, but I'm enjoying the banter. Princess of clumsiness, huh? Well, I smell a competition! Only kidding. I bet we could make a sport out of it, though.

As for people laughing at your expense, I bet you'd be surprised at what unique athletic qualities you possess but it's hard when people mock you all the time. I'm the same with catching things but I've learned to just be all yoda about it and just try to catch things without effort. It's kind of like throwing gum balls at the wall and seeing what sticks, but when I do catch something without looking, it's pretty cool. I'm sure it's random and just by chance, but I just try to let the embarrassment go. I'll probably drop it or miss, but when I don't, I gloat. Then I trip over something immediately afterwards. I like to mess with people by throwing in some intentional clumsiness, kind of like Chevy Chase on Saturday Night Live when he would impersonate Ford (I def just showed my age with that reference).

Glasstoria, wear your princess tiara with pride. I would be proud to trip over things with you. I'm fairly certain the phrase, "bull in a china store" was coined because of me....

Does clumsiness mean just dropping things? Because I never really drop anything. I've had the same mobile phone for about four and a half years now and haven't dropped it once.

But I'm clumsy in other things I do. Once my brother was standing behind me and I didn't know he was there, and I moved quickly and I knocked his drink out of his hands (lucky it was in a plastic cup, not a glass). But I'm not sure if it was due to me moving too awkwardly, or my brother standing too near people, or the way my ''non peripheral vision'' didn't see him there, or just a general accident that can be easily done for anybody.

My daughter is very clumsy and I am investigating, She has a diagnosis off ADD & GAD I suspect she has Autistic traits her brother is on the spectrum but the professional do not agree away another story.

She takes Ritalin for ADD and when she is on the medication she has some mishaps but nothing compared to when so is off it of forgets to take it. I know if she has forgotten to take her med as she will be tripping, falling, breaking. The OT said it was to do with depth perception, but she is also hypermobile, low muscle tone.

Its good to read she is not alone and helps me not to worry to much, She does give us a laugh she can break or damage things in ways that you could not imagine. Once her mobile fone in her pocket she bend down to pick something up and her phone ended in the mop bucket full of bleach. She has cost me a fortune looks like its not going to change any time soon

How old is your daughter? Depth perception is def a factor for me but I've learned to work with it. Although I never competed in sports that much, I think trying a lot of different activities that pushed my limits without threatening my safety helped me a lot. I learned to water ski, snow ski, figure skate, tumble at a young age and even though I didn't excel at any one sport, it helped me with confidence and to learn how to work with my hand eye coordination as well as body awareness. If she likes to dance or has a flair for mimicking, she might enjoy something like yoga, martial arts, fitness or dance classes. People made fun of me and as much as my mother wanted to protect me from this, she taught me to have a sense of humor and beat them to the punch.


Your daughter's balance and coordination may not be about a defect or disorder, but more of a difference and she will learn to work with it. You mentioned low muscle tone and I don't think I deal with this, so I understand that she may have unique challenges that I'm not aware of, but I promise you I deal with my own battles with balance. Maybe you can ask your daughter what helps her to feel comfortable and what would allow her to work on her issues. I realize communication might be a factor (not for me but I try to over-communicate which has it's own slew of problems), and I totally respect the struggles and frustrations you experience with the advice from others. But it's wonderful that you are trying to help her with this and you're doing a lot of research. She will appreciate this very much one day, if not already.

Again, back to balance- she should try as many activities as she can be encouraged to do because she might learn she has some unique skills. I've read about athletes that had Aspergers and often they would have excelled at one particular part of the sport, like kicking field goals, but they don't engage much in the sport as a whole. I'm like this. There's usually one small part of the activity that I will be a natural at and I enjoy these moments. If she's just not into activities like this, then allow her to explore the things she loves to do.

I remember very much what it was like to be a child, teenager and young adult and no one picked up on my issues so I had to go it alone. And that's cool too because it helped me to define who I am. But it would have helped me to have some support and that is where my opinion/advice comes from. But it makes me all warm and fuzzy to read about all the parents who try to help their children. It speaks volumes about you and I hope you have support as well. I appreciate that you don't make your daughter feel guilty for her clumsy moments. My father has never let me forget how much I've cost him and we don't have a relationship now.

Someone once said to me, "You always do things in the most awkward way possible." My clumsiness is apparent enough to provide comic relief (to me and everyone around me) on a regular basis.