Dyscalculia is dyslexia’s much lesser-known counterpart for another part of the brain. Where dyslexics have difficulty reading or making sense of letters, we dyscalculics can’t make sense of numbers. Other effects of the disorder are

difficulties telling time
difficulty seeing straight lines as straight
spatial reasoning issues
short term memory blackouts
difficulty following patterns, directions, or sequenced instructions
severe problems remembering names, places, and dates.

The exact cause is unknown but it has been suggested that synaptic bridges between the left and right brain do not form correctly, resulting in much greater dependence on only one side of the brain (and often resulting in grossly lopsided abilities). I for example taught myself to read before I was even in kindergarten and achieved a college-level verbal ability in middle school, yet I cannot reliably count any given group of objects.

The biggest problem with dyscalculia is that so very few people KNOW IT EXISTS and therefore there are no support systems in place. Dyslexia is high-profile and there are programs, grants, and studies for it. Mention dyscalculia and most people go “huh?” There are few to no sources for support, aid, or even information about the disorder.

Dyscalculia can ruin your life. I cannot get a job as a cashier, which is usually the first level of employment in any retail job (I‘ve been trying without success to get a stocking job but half the businesses around here expect stockers to be backup cashiers, too), and have had to drop out of college because I could not pass the math portions of the credit requirements. I have been in special ed since second grade, I have had tutors both paid and volunteer who have tried every method you can think of, I have had extraordinarily kind teachers stay after school as long as four hours to try and help me, and I have even gone to an educational counselor to try and get back into college on a learning disabilities clause, to no avail, BECAUSE THERE ARE NO PROGRAMS FOR IT. The best they can do is give a dyscalculic extra time and a calculator, which is a little like giving a blind person a color wheel and telling them to point to the red square on the wall. It just doesn't help.

P.S. It’s very insulting to hear perfectly capable people, after you’ve explained dyscalculia as a math disability, say, “o lol I must have that too lololol’. No. Shut. The. Hell. Up. You have NO idea. When you’ve been learning your times tables for years and still can’t recite them despite hours a day of drills and flash cards until your stepfather starts hitting you over it, when you’ve been yanked from the gifted and talented program to instead be thrown in with the kids who drool, or when you’ve been the twenty year old at the bus stop, crying your eyes out in desperate frustration, starving and with no electricity or phone at the apartment because you’ve been unemployed for a year and are surrounded by open jobs you can’t even fake performing, you can ‘lol’ at me all you like. Until then, please stop belittling the problem because you had trouble with Algebra 2 or forgot someone’s birthday. Seriously.