Women’s perceptions of how their dyslexia impacts on their mothering

Women with children have been depicted as struggling to justify themselves in the shadow of intensive mothering ideology. However, little is said about women who have a disability such as dyslexia, and how disability may intersect with intensive mothering ideology to present additional challenges. In this paper, life-story interviews are drawn upon to start to unpack the ways in which mothering and dyslexia may intersect. The themes discussed include: fear and perceived challenges of having a child with dyslexia; how mothers perceived their impairments manifest in their mothering, including poor organisational skills, short-term memory, reading and spelling; and how mothers may attempt to reframe the apparent contradiction between a ‘good’ mother and a mother with dyslexia by, for example, portraying themselves as a positive role-model for their child and better able to identify and cater for their child’s needs.