<p>My oldest brother and youngest sister are both left handed. My brother has beautiful penmanship, because my mother taught him how to write. My sister, not so much. </p>
<p>They never did dishes or household chores when we were kids because my mother used to say that when she watched them doing a task, she thought they doing it “backwards.” The rest of the kids would tell her “don’t watch them.”</p>
<p>" But if you gave them one? They’d probably be like “WHATTTT! Is THIS what it’s like for everybody else? Why didn’t anybody tell me?!?”</p>
<p>Shrinkwrap, I know! Your probably correct (notice I didn’t say right!). It’s just something that I never think of. I don’t see a lot of lefty scissors in the catalogues and kid’s scissors are made with greater attention to quality these days. Fiskars is the brand I buy and they are better than most adult scissors. </p>
<p>If I try to use lefty scissors, it feels crazy to me! And I am a true lefty. I do everything with my left hand. I will make a point of checking in with the left handed students to see what their scissor situation is.</p>
<p>In terms of cutting, I have noticed a general decline in children’s skills over the past decade. Many of my fourth and fifth grade students struggle significantly when trying to follow a line with the scissors. I attribute it to the advent of excessive testing in the schools. Children are given little time for tactile pursuits these days.</p>
<p>I remember hearing about a study years ago that determined that lefties die earlier than righties (not significantly in terms of true life span but statistically significant). The theory is that there is accumulated stress that that comes a a result of living in a world designed for right handed people. Things that seem benign such as turning a doorknob, using a spiral notebook, trying to follow knitting directions, etc. put stress on the mind and body that takes its toll over a lifetime.</p>
<p>There was another similar study about short people. Looks like I’m doomed.</p>
<p>I remember hearing an expert years ago on a radio program saying that actually 75% of the population is born right-handed and 25% has ambidextrous genes. These latter people end up developing a preference one way or the other and split about half and half (with right-handedness slightly favored due to societal influence). I’ve never heard this theory repeated since but it makes perfect sense to me…that’s why so many people (like my D) favor one side but have ambidextrous tendencies, and why in some pairs of identical twins one is right-handed and one is left.</p>
<p>^I’ve actually heard it that there are two types of the gene: one for right-handedness, and one for a random choice. So someone with two copies of the random choice gene will be randomly right-handed or non-right-handed. But that’s just a hypothesis – nobody has identified a gene or genes yet.</p>
<p>The two categories, by the way, are right-handed and non-right-handed, including the ambidextrous and all strengths of lefties. Non-right-handedness is a spectrum, so some people are exclusively left-handed, but some people do only some tasks with the left hand/foot/other body parts.</p>
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<p>I’ve just adapted to using a right-handed desk. In the room where I have most of my classes, that’s all there are. Now, using a left-handed desk feels weird for me.</p>
<p>I believe identical twins who have different dominant hands are actually mirror-image twins. I’ve come across only 2 sets of mirror image twins in my experience. I find them fascinating.</p>
<p>My biggest “aha!” moment was a left handed Henkle boning knife. It’s not just the handle, but the side the blade is sharpened on. It was then that I realized how much folks take for granted.</p>
<p>And yes, some left handed things are awkward for me at age 50, but I tend to think its because of a lifetime of accommodating.</p>
<p>I’m left handed, and have found that I also sometimes do sports left handed and sometimes right handed. I actually tend to switch hands during a single bowling game (but then again, I’m not a very good bowler).</p>
<p>Scissors were always a challenge for me. I wouldn’t switch hands, but I would contort my hands to get the pressure right so that they would cut. Fiskars scissors worked fine.</p>
<p>I hate the writing smudge. After every essay my hand would be black. My solution for notebooks was to get the ones that are bound on top! That made it way easier for me to take notes.</p>
<p>Another challenge that I’ve faced are using can openers. My mom sometimes watches and laughs as I try to use them. I’m also not allowed to set the table- I always do it backwards!</p>
<p>Driving was never much of a challenge in that way. However, I’ve never driven a stick, and I imagine that would be more difficult. My father and I are the only lefties in the family.</p>
<p>My husband is right handed but is really ambidextrous. He uses the computer mouse on the left as much as the right and plays ping pong with either hand.</p>
<p>One of our kids is left handed but is also very ambidextrous. He uses his right hand for the computer mouse and even throws right hand. I’m embarrassed to admit that I never bought him any lefty scissors, but after reading this thread, I’m tempted. Both my father and sister are left handed and we always attributed any imperfections (bad handwriting, inability to skip, jump rope or wink) to my sister’s left handedness.</p>
<p>Hmmm. The whole scissor thing. I don’t know. It just seems that if a child can adapt to usin right handed scissors it’s better than being dependent on left hand ones taht may not be available in ever situation everywhere you go. I adapted to righty ones early and now I can’t use lefty ones. Kids are very resillient with very plastic brains. I have had students with tremendous disabilities who have learned to adapt beautifully. As a teacher, I will make myself more aware if a left handed child is struggling with the righty scissors but I do think its preferable to adapt to the readily available equipment.</p>
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<p>I grew up struggling with right-handed scissors. Never once owned a pair of “left-handed” scissors. I occasionally have to use my right hand to cut tape, but it is really hard and does not work very well. Normally I have to get just a little bit cut and then tear it which means it’s messy at times…</p>
<p>Just a slight hi-jack - I thought I might get my lefty son a pair of scissors for his birthday as a kind of joke but when I went on the Amazon site there was a huge difference in prices. Any recommendations for reasonably priced lefty scissors that work well?</p>
<p>I use scissors almost daily for art and sewing. I like Fiskars right/left combo scissors, but can’t use the “true lefties” very well (blades reversed.)<br>
I would like a lefthanded cake/pie server.</p>
<p>My brother is ambidextrous, but he is really nondextrous. He does things equally poorly with either hand.</p>
<p>MollieB-
Re: post 57- I promise you I will bore you to death talking about pre-peri and postnatal injuries and pathological left handedness. But we did find that there are subtle trophic limb changes in the contralateral limb of pathological lefties (ie their right foot and sometimes rt. thumb are slightly smaller. Any lefty out there have a tough time buying shoes b/c you have a slightly smaller rt foot? Talk to me.</p>
<p>I hate butter knives-- as a lefty I cannot use #<em>%%)$</em> butter knives. Water fountains are a pain too. And school desks where the writing portion is attached to the right side of the chair. Ugh. Don’t get me started this early in the morning.</p>
<p>When I was in 9th grade starting a new high school (all girls) - 3/4 of the advanced math class were lefties. Lefty girls are good at math? I was there, but one of the few right handed ones.</p>
<p>Since I first learned to drive in East Africa, I’ve actually driven with sticks on both sides. I can’t remember it being an issue once you got used to one or the other.</p>
<p>hops_scout–when I switched to using righty scissors, I taught myself to use them right-handed–it’d be a horror to use them left-handed.</p>
<p>I don’t know what Fiskars scissors are, but the only lefty ones that ever made sense to me were the blades-reversed ones. I took umbrage whenever someone suggested “either-hand” scissors for my S. No such thing, to me. </p>
<p>I use a mouse righty. But if my right arm got tired (happened more often in the past with the old rollerball mice than with the optical ones), I’d switch the configuration and go lefty for a while. So i guess I’m mouse-ambidextrous.</p>
<p>I remember hearing once that if you are the left-handed child of a left-handed mother, your brain dominance is more like that of a right-handed person. I don’t know why that would be-- any thoughts?</p>
<p>2 true lefty children and the other is a “hybrid”. We couldn’t figure out which way oldest child was going to go, kept switching back and forth as a very young child. We finally encouraged the right hand for writing, and sports are played right handed. Eating and other things are done lefty, which makes dining easy. The children sit next to each other, all left hand eaters - no problem!</p>
<p>The younger 2 came out of the womb lefties - sucking on the left hand. For the sports my middle child has played it’s been a huge plus - especially since right handed dad also encouraged the ability to use the right hand as well. Basketball and water polo. </p>
<p>Over the years I’ve tried to keep left handed stuff around for my lefties, but the quality of such stuff is less than ideal. Never found a decent left handed can opener. Good quality Fiskar scissors always seemed to work out okay for them and we do have a couple of pairs of lefty scissors in the house. I got “good ones” at a fabric store.</p>
<p>There’s a “history” of lefties on H’s side of the family. None on mine. But wait - is there some suggestion that this is attributed to something that took place in the womb?</p>