Hi all! Today, Esther’s weekly writing prompt is “tests”. Oh my! This made me think of so many things. IQ tests: I’ve had half a dozen or more during my life. Final exams: so glad they’re over with and it’s been twenty years since I graduated high school. Psychological assessments: I still have a love-hate relationship with those. And that goes for tests in general, I guess.
After all, as a child, I didn’t mind taking IQ tests. When I was twelve, I got the infamous Wechsler IQ test, well, the verbal part of it, since I’m blind and the performance part isn’t accessible. I got a score of 154, which, according to the psychologist, indicated giftedness. I’m pretty sure there were all sorts of things wrong with that assessment though.
When I was 30, I got another IQ test, Wechsler again but the adult version and now they removed the clear distinction between verbal and performance IQ so the report just said I got “parts” of the test. My overall IQ score had dropped to 119 I believe. That’s still above-average and I’m pretty sure that’s correct. However, I wish there were a performance IQ test for blind people, because I am pretty sure that’d show where my real limits are. Not that I’m proud of being disabled, but I am and if it could be proven on a test, that’d be much better than an ever-changing psychiatric diagnosis.
Final exams. Like I said, I’m glad it’s been twenty years since I graduated high school. My final exams were quite frustrating, as not only was I horribly nervous, but my computer crashed once in the middle of the test. I graduated from what in the UK is called grammar school and honestly I have no clue how I did it. I mean, well, I know, sort of: the same way I “passed” my IQ tests, ie. being a pretty above-average memorizer. Too bad that a good memory and decent academic skills don’t get me far in life. It takes more than test-taking abilities to be successful, after all.
A Multitude of Musings 
The only tests I take now are medical tests, blood pressure, blood work and weighing. Ugh. I just went for a checkup and no more tests for six mot! Yay
I dislike these tests much more than I did school tests.
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Ah, I see. I think indeed medical tests are usually scarier than school tests, mostly because your health is, in my opinion, more important than any academic achievement.
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I’ve never had an IQ test. I’m with you on final exams, I hated them!
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oh you’re so lucky not to have had any IQ tests. Thanks for empathizing with me on school exams.
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This is so interesting. I had to do an IQ test for an accelerated training programme at a bank. They didn’t ever tell me my score but I got the job so I guess it couldn’t have been that bad!
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Oh, interesting. I amnot sure that in hindsight I’d have preferred not to know the result of the IQ tests I got.
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The test I got the most nervous about was a driving test.
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Ah yes, I can imagine. I am glad in some way that I’ve never had to learn to drive because I’m blind.
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I have never had an IQ test done, although thinking about it I did do something like that many year ago to determent what type of government payment I should go on and they put my on the disability pension, wasn’t on it long as Tim found another job
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Thanks for sharing. That’s so interesting that they did something like an IQ test to determine what benefits you should get.
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I take depression and anxiety tests before my medications are renewed every month at my doctor’s office. Otherwise it has been years since I took a test. I had anxiety always on test days in school – hated final exams! But the most annoying tests were the standardized tests we had to take every year in grade school where we filled in the little circles with a number 2 pencil, The test were in blocks for different subjects but overall lasted ALL day. Longest days in school!
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Thanks for sharing. That’s so interesting that you had to take standardized tests each year in grade school. We only had those in sixth grade to determine what level of secondary school we should attend and then before we could graduate high school. Nowadays kids here have them each year I think. That would’ve made me so nervous!
Re depression and anxiety questionnaires, I honestly only took those once during my most recent autism assessment in 2017 and yet I’m on the highest dose of my antidepressant. I occasionally complete the iPhone’s questionnaire and my score for anxiety is almost always “severe” and for depression it’s also usually moderate to severe.
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You’re welcome. Yeah, every visit to get a refill on my depression and anxiety meds I have to do those assessments. It’s odd you have only done it once. I hope June is good to you!
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It’s indeed quite odd. In my case, it was incredibly easy to get my meds upped but getting them tapered is much harder. And I don’t mean it’s harder to feel the effects of a taper, but harder to convince a doctor to decrease my dosage. That’s probably because I take most of my meds to keep me “manageable”. or so my care team believe.
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