Visit our online shop for your left-handed productsIs it just me… or is it a left-handed thing?
As a result of our question on Left Handed Kissing Confusion, we got loads of responses about other things left-handers find awkward but have never really connected with them being left-handed. Apart from the problem of greeting people with a kiss and getting it wrong, we also received comments on other things that made us think….is it just me or is there more to it? Some of the things that were mentioned were:
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It seems that a lot of the quirks that we have are a result of being left-handed in a right-handed world. Listed below are some of the responses we received from our Club Members when we asked . “Is it just me…?” See how many you identify with. The quirk that started it all was social kissing, and you can read a selection of anecdotes about that on our kissing confusion page.
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- It was only recently that I realised why, when I try clothes on in a shop and put them back on the rack, they’re always facing the wrong way because, I’m LEFT-HANDED.~ Simone Hurst
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I’ve noticed that even when loading the dishwasher, I start on the right, but my husband, who is right handed, loads on the left first, and folding sheets together is a nightmare, he folds the opposite to me, and if I don’t remember the sheet gets twisted not folded. ~ Carol Wiltshire |
- One really embarrassing thing I do at dinner parties is drink from the person next to me’s glass. I just reach out with my left hand and lift and its not until I see that I’m getting strange looks that I realise what I’m doing. I tell myself I won’t do it again then I do. Also the cheese board! I just dread someone asking me to cut a piece for them because I just can’t do it, it usually ends up on the table and I feel stupid. What should be an enjoyable night out is something I dread. ~ Evelyn Rose
- When first seated at a dinner party or restaurant table, I always have to wait for the person to my left to take a sip of their drink, or eat their bread roll to make sure I don’t take the wrong one by mistake! ~ Lauren, UK
- Microscopes!! The fine focus is always on the right!! its probably just me but I use them all day and it drives me mad (boss too mean to buy me a proper one). ~ Debbie, UK
- Am also a glider pilot, and there are an unusual number of left-handed pilots, particularly the really good ones e.g. national & world champions. We tend to be better & more comfortable at turning right, whereas the right-handed pilots are better at turning to the left. ~ Sarah Platt
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I just wonder if anyone out there is like me. When I’m out with friends walking I have to be on the left side of the road when walking and on the left of people when I’m talking otherwise I feel uneasy. ~ Jay |
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- Receiving change from shop assistant – I nearly always find myself struggling to hold it without the coins falling all over the floor. (I’m talking about a combination of notes and coins). I think it’s because people naturally hand change as if the person receiving will hold out their right hand – but I hold out my left. ~ Emma Hurley
- I start painting a wall left to right, both the right handers in my family go right to left, and they couldn’t figure out why I did it “backwards” as they called it. It wasn’t backwards for me. They finally figured it out. It was “left-handed logic” as they call it every time they think I’m doing something the wrong way.
- Just to let you know I have just been decorating and was papering the room from right to left and find it very difficult to work that way around rather than left to right ~ M. Izzard
- I don’t know what the odds are, but I’d love to know how many left handed people are also directionally challenged like me - i.e., have trouble with north south east and west and distances, and are constantly having to make u-turns when going somewhere. I’ve had this problem all my life and have often been asked what it feels like to “be lost” and am I scared when it happens. I just tell them, I don’t have a problem with it, I just consider it going on an adventure and I eventually get where I going . It just takes a little bit longer and I consider the new things I see along the way a learning experience.~Dot Sale, Ontario, Canada.
- When going to a cinema or theatre I am always drawn like a magnet to the left hand side to find a seat. If I have to sit on the right hand side I don’t feel comfortable all night and just sit there thinking how much better I would enjoy the film etc if I was on the left. Is this common with other people? ~ Maureen Elliott
- I put on a belt backwards, as in using my left hand and inserting it in the right side. Most of the time its hard to notice a difference, but there’s belts out there, like ones with buckles that end up being upside down. I know it’s not just me because two other left-handers I know do the exact same thing, so I was wondering how many other left-handers do this as well? ~ Scott Farrar, USA
- I just bought this new belt with a designer buckle. I started putting the belt through the straps in my jeans as usual, but when I wanted to close the buckle, I discovered that the buckle logo was upside down. “How weird”, I said to myself, and then it dawned on me: this belt was designed for righties! Somehow I, as a lefty, have an innate impulse to thread a buckle through my jeans straps beginning at the opposite side from that of a RH! (My old belt didn’t cause me any trouble of this sort, since it didn’t matter in what way you turned the buckle). Before the time of the CDs, when one still had LP records, I used to have mine on a shelf beneath my record player. I’ve always been meticulous about sorting things alphabetically, and I used to do that with my records, too. Somehow, though, my friends would consider my “shelf order” strange, since I put all artists whose name/group name began with an “A”, at the right-hand side of the shelf, which was totally natural to me. Couldn’t get it what was so strange about that, until recently when I came to think of the fact that it must have been a lefty instinct, to do it “the RIGHT way round”!
~ Helene, Sweden
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Among a million of things I just can’t do in this right-handed world, here’s one that made me really ask to myself….is it just me? I am just not able to uncork a bottle of wine, simply ’cause I unscrew in the wrong direction. The cork opener never makes it into the cork, no matter how hard I try to push it! My husband makes fun of me, saying that I always use my left-handedness as an excuse just because I’m not able to do stuff….Will they ever understand? ~Sara, Italy |
- When taking “hanging files” (where the papers are laid sideways) out of filing cabinets and opening them up, the papers are always upside down for me when a right-hander has been doing the filing. I know now that I mustn’t slip new papers into hanging files without first checking the direction of the other pages – which are always upside down to my way of thinking! Luckily, I have a personal filing cabinet, where only I file the papers, so every file opens with documents the correct way up for me! ~ Laura, UK
- Myself and one of my best friends were trying on clothes and she wanted to try on the shorts I was wearing-with a belt. When she got them on and was trying to use the belt, she was having trouble getting it undone so she could do it. She made the comment “you and your left handedness.” I had not realized she was having trouble with doing the belt until she said that and I asked what she meant. Evidently, I had my belt “backwards”. I have to wonder how many other “leftisms” there are that we (lefties) are unaware of? ~ Anonymous, USA
- It seems my right-handed husband and four kids have all “learned” from me! My husband learned to change and dress our four children the left-handed way since I had the baby’s rooms set up for my convenience. Kitchen activities were also done “my” way. My kids are now in their 20′s and my daughter commented that she does many activities like a lefty because she learned from me. She says it’s my fault she’s all messed up but I just tell her I did her a favour because she’s skilled with both hands! Anything we leftie’s teach our kids or spouses will be noticed by other right-handed people! ~ Doreen Place
- I have recently realised that one reason I have difficulty with the new chip and pin system is that I put my card in “the wrong way round” – the automatic way for me as a left-handed person but not for the machine – created by and for right-handed people I think?Is this something lots of you have already discovered?! ~ Barbara Robinson
- I just wanted to say I felt so much better after reading all the things we left handers have in common. I constantly have problems with handshakes, belts, crossing someone’s path (am I supposed to go to the right of them or to the left?) and of course the kissing! I also appreciated the people who visualize things in the opposite way. I recently graduated from law school and I was once told by a professor that although I reached the right conclusion I came at the problem with “backward thinking logic”. I also organized all of my notebooks in school so that they opened backwards; my classmates never wanted to borrow notes! I also have problems with outside water faucets — I always try to turn it left to turn it off. And when I read magazines I always flip through them back to front. ~Lesley Holloway
- The quirk I had trouble with wouldn’t have been noticed if I hadn’t been in the military (US Air Force). As a lefty, I’m more comfortable carrying my purse on my right shoulder, leaving my left arm free. In fact, I find it almost impossible to keep a shoulder bag ON my left shoulder when I try. Here’s the trouble — salutes are done with the right hand and thus, the right arm must be free at all times. It’s even in the regulations that purses, umbrellas, briefcases, etc., should all be carried on the left. I had trouble with that for the entire time I was in the Air Force. I tended to just carry my purses in my left hand (even the shoulder bags), as they would never stay on the shoulder. Very frustrating! My next comment concerns the preference for sitting on the left side of theaters. I don’t feel uncomfortable if I have to sit on the right side, but I do tend to automatically go to the left when entering a theater. This turns out to be an advantage. Studies have shown that the large majority of the population goes to the right when a choice is presented (like going into a theater or choosing from two lines for an amusement park ride) — probably due to handedness. An authority on Disney World has even put into his book about the Park that you’ll spend much less time standing in line if you veer to the left when presented with two lines for the ride! So, go with your quirk and veer to the left — it will almost assuredly be quicker/shorter/less-crowded over there! ~ Lynn, Denver, CO USA
- Regarding shaking with the left hand, I am both a lefty and in the Guides. Guides and Scouts around the world shake left handed, which is perfectly natural to me. Unfortunately it makes things even harder when I have to shake hands in a non-Guiding situation, I am even less likely to remember to offer my right hand. This has meant that in professional situations, I’ve found out that quite senior people were Scouts or Guides and/or left handed and ended up leaving my boss totally out of the conversation as we then talk about handedness or Scouting. ~A. Kerr
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Is it just me? Everything at my workstation in my job flows right to left! It drives my co-workers crazy when they come looking for something at my area. They think my workstation set up is “backwards”. I just assumed its a “leftie” quirk. Same thing in my kitchen by the way…. ~ Colleen, USA |
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- I always find that if I have to flick through a book I hold it in my right hand and flick the pages with my left starting at the back of the book. It drives me insane when I want to use a dictionary because I think of the alphabet going forwards but then I’m flicking with the letters going backwards. Whenever I fill up my motorbike I have to go to a pump that is on my left other wise it just doesn’t feel right. Unfortunately my car has the fuel cap on the right hand side and I frequently get myself tangled up with the pumps. I also us one of those flip open wallets and always find it difficult to put notes and credit cards away without turning it upside down then everything ends up falling out! ~ Pauline Woodhall, UK
- A constant annoyance for me is the placement of receipts when signing credit card transactions. Cashiers almost always angle the receipt towards my right hand, so I inevitably have to re-angle it towards my left hand before signing. This can sometimes be a problem if the cashier keeps a finger on the receipt (usually due to a draft from a fan or doorway). The most amazing incident of this nature was a few months ago in a well known UK DIY store: the cashier placed the receipt angled towards my right hand, I re-angled the receipt towards my left, but before I could put pen to paper the cashier re-angled the receipt towards my right again! ~ Michele Wilkinson, Cambs
- My gripe is with the till desks, usually petrol stations, that secure the pen for the signing of the receipt with a piece of tatty string that is attached to what ever on the right side and too short for the lefthander. The assistant also offers the receipt to me addressing my right hand. I have found that banks are no better they just have posh ball chain that’s too short instead of string ~ Bob Beaney
- I was recently looking into purchasing a new horse. When I lifted his leg to look at his hoof he tried to kick out. This had never happened to me with my other two horses so I thought there was something wrong. The owner informed me that I was picking up his hoof by touching the inside of his leg. He said most people touch the horse on the outside of the leg and this is why he was spooked. I never realized it but being left-handed I naturally reach inside the leg, whereas it is awkward for a right-handed person to reach inside, so therefore would pick up the leg from the outside. Also, when I was a kid, my mom asked me to put up the pencil sharpener (one of those crank kinds). I did as I was told. A few days later my dad complained that he could not sharpen his pencil as the sharpener was upside down!!! ~ Linda Vonhof, Westhampton Beach, NY
- Is it me? i’m the only left hander at college, and if I’ve been using the computers I get a lot of complaints because the mouse is on the wrong side of the computer for the boring people of this world.~ Bev Syson, Ilkeston
- My ex-husband and I moved to a new home and since he was travelling for work I had to unpack everything. We lived in that house for 3 ½ years and he complained the whole time that nothing was in the “right” place. I just kept saying “welcome to my world” with a big smile on my face. I hadn’t even realized I had set everything up left-handed – I just put everything where is was supposed to go. ~ Jodi Olson
- When I am drinking especially in a pub or club I feel that if I don’t hold the glass in my left hand that I am not getting the full enjoyment of the drink. Sometimes I find that I am drinking with my right hand and realise that something is not going quite right and have to change! ~ David Robinson
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It works the same way when walking past someone but don’t know which side to let them pass you on, so you end up doing a little dance and bounce on both feet before one person takes the lead and chooses a side. the difference is, it’s with your neck and so you end up looking stupider! Although it can be quite humorous ~ Laura Piplica, UK |
- Whenever I read a book and the author describes a scene, I always find later, as the plot unfolds that I have visualised it completely the wrong way round, as a mirror image. Is it me? ~ Linda Dainton, UK
- Is it only me? I run my own business from home which does involve sending information by post to prospective clients. When the information I send runs to more than one page I like everyone else staple the pages together. Often, too often the actual staple doesn’t penetrate the paper. Is this a fault that other left handers have encountered and if it is how have they overcome this annoying problem?~ Bob Westecott
- I joined a dance class (Line-Dancing) and had a hard time following everyone…All the steps were lead on the right foot , Of course I instinctively started on my left and I was always a step behind everyone…I was so ashamed, I couldn’t keep up. ~ Marty
- Handshakes! I naturally put out my left hand…d’oh! Oh the trials of living in a right handed world… ~ Nancy Hopkins, UK
- I have difficulties with locks and keys is it just me ? ~ Frances Todd, UK
- Walking in the out door. I am always doing this. It drives my son crazy! Or walking on the wrong side of the staircase. ~ Cindy Timo
- I was wondering , growing up was it difficult for you to learn how to tie your shoes properly? Especially learning from a rightie? I ended up making two bunny ears and tying them together rather than the loop around and pull. Also making check marks (ticks). Did people tell you growing up checking each others papers that your checks were “backwards”? ~ Jennifer, The Bronx
- I used to hold all my four children on my right side, leaving my left hand (a working one) free. So I am absolutely sure that all the discussions about women carrying their babies on their left side so that children could hear their mothers’ hearts beating are just nonsense! It is just a matter of right- or left-handedness. ~ Irina Radetskaya, Russia
Thank you to everyone who responded to our question so far – it is great to be part of such a helpful worldwide community of left-handers and we look forward to receiving your further comments – please use the form below.
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I wonder if cigarette lighters are right-handed? I just cannot get them to work. Or maybe because it’s because I have never smoked.
i want to know if this is wierd! im left handed and i get lots of comments on how i hold my pen in between my middle and ring finger when im writing. is that odd?
and also, when painting i use my right hand? whats up with that?!
i a maths genius, and very good at science, music and art, which is wierd as a cross over because maths amd science isnt usually associated with creativity…. would you call me ambidexterous or am i just a freak ? :L
plz reply !
Don’t worry about being odd. As long as you find it comfy, that’s what matters.
my daughter is left handed and we have trouble getting her times tables to set in her memory. we’ve tried writing them out, memorising and singing them out loud. I don’t know if my brother (a left hander) had trouble, but her spelling is awful (as was and is his still). Any tips? She’s nearly 9
Left handedness is often associated with dyslexia or dysgraphia. Im left handed and dyslexic, I did research on it also. I even have a hard time remembering times tables.
Maybe get it checked out?
Is it just me, or do other lefties have to strategize their seating arrangement when dining with family and friends in order to keep from bumping elbows with them when we eat? I always try to stay on the outside left to prevent this. My family always does this little shuffle around the table because we have 4 lefties in our bunch and the rest are righties.
Onlookers probably wonder what the heck we’re doing. lol
Also, I’d just like to say that I think living in a right handed world has given me an advantage in life. I’ve learned to think outside the box, get creative, learn different ways of accomplishing things, etc. What’s that old saying about necessity being the mother of invention..
Oh and one more.. I notice which hand is dominant on everyone I see. My daughter swears I’m obsessed because I always point it out when I see lefty. I’m not obsessed, but it is something I’m very aware of…Is it just me??
No matter what I always like to walk on the left side on the road which can be dangerous at times . I don;t know why but I am drawn to it.
Does any one else have this thing with the road ?
I work in a public library, and I cannot help but notice when someone fills out the application for a library card with his/her left hand! It’s not just you.
I always feel at comfort when i read the newspaper from back to front. No only newspaper but any magazines.
Is it because i m left handed?
Whenever I do candy stripe friendship bracelets I do them backwards. I never even noticed till my friends pointed it out! I also have to make sure I’m in a position where i won’t bang elbows with someone at a meal. It’s physically impossible to write in 2+ inch binders and spiral notebooks are just stupid.
Me & My Boyfriend Is Left Handed French Kissing Is Really Awkward.
You need lots of practice.
Signing when the pen is fixed on the right is hard but it was even harder convince the anaesthisiologist that the reason why I took the pen with the left was not because I was confused from giving birth but because I’m left handed. Of course she had positioned herself on the right of the bed making things even harder for me since I had to twist around to sign.
Growing up I had problems with most of the things mentioned earlier but I had to adjust. To learn how to tie my laces I asked my cousin’s help who’s also left handed. My grandmother was always afraid for my safety when I was holding a knife because I was doing everything backwards and when I was young I couldn’t understand why I couldn’t use her scissors to cut a garment.
At grade school I had to use one of those desks united with the chairs where the writting surface is on the right. I needed two of them!!
Right handed classmates were happy to sit on my right, that way they could copy from my paper (and I could from theirs) but they couldn’t use my notebooks since I was writing in a weird way (even for me) in order to avoid spiral.
It’s annoying that the first thing I do when sitting in a restaurant is put the tableware on the left, including the glasses but when the waiter brings me a new fork he puts it on the right.
when you say you had trouble tieing laces, what do you mean because im 14 and walk around school with my laces opened :L its annoying and embarrassin but iv got use to it. could you just not tie them at all or could you tie them a bit but theyd open again??? tnax
I can never decide which hand to use for what! left for writing and most things but i find myself using my right every so often for example mouse on the computer is on the right side. always get my lefts and rights mixed up!
I play rounders, and bowl with my left (which annoys everyone, they dont know where to stand..) and then bat with my right.
Batting has always been a challenge for me too.. I think I’m terrible with both hands, but I always try both ways just in case.
And I also find myself doing a lot of things right handed just to keep from having to switch everything around. I honestly didn’t even know they made left handed scissors until a few years ago so I’ve always had to cut with my right hand.
Left handed scissors have been around for many years but they have not been easy to get hold of. You can see our wide range of left handed scissors here
http://www.anythinglefthanded.co.uk/acatalog/scissors.html
Fish knives! Of course it’s typical that something you only ever use in a “posh” setting would be one that’s impossible to use with any grace if you’re a leftie. I have once come across a set of fish knives that were straight rather than bent and could therefore be used in either hand, but every other one I have ever had to use has required serious concentration, eating the wrong way round!
Oh and another thing that I find SO funny is this:
Nobody in my whole family, on either side, for generations even, has EVER been right handed. I think that on my mom’s side there MAY have been like a great great grandmother that was partially left handed or something like that.
And then I come along, and I’m left handed. (but they didn’t know that for awhile; I would always write Allie with my left hand, switch it to my right hand, and write Beth. Funny!)
Then, to add to my left handedness, my mom had two more kids, and guess what? Haha, they’re left handed, of course.
I just find it so weird. It couldn’t have been passed on through genetics since nobody in our family was left handed. We just all three ended up lefties.
I always hate when I’m writing and my friends ask me, “what the heck is up with the side of your hand? There’s lead all over it!”
I’m like, “Well, if this world wasn’t made for right handed people, then I wouldn’t do that because I wouldn’t write left-to-right!!”
I’m not sure if this is common, but I found that aside from writing, I’m very ambidextrous. I didn’t notice it for quite some time, but I was painting a loft type thing with my mom one day and she pointed out that I kept switching my paintbrush from hand to hand, I would use whichever one was more conveniently closer to the part of the loft I was painting. I do the same thing when I’m eating. It’s like there’s some foods that I have to eat with the fork, you know, and I observed that righties just reach across their plate and eat everything with their right hand. I’m not like that….if I want to eat the potato and it’s on the right side, then I’ll use my right hand. Then I may want to eat my macaroni so I’ll switch the fork to my left and and eat the macaroni.
People talk about it being weird and everything, but I think I’m ambidextrous even though I only write with my left hand…and I’m pretty grateful for it. Everything aside from writing is easier for me because I can do it with whichever hand I please! (:
I have always organized my kitchen for my left-handedness. My son is ambidextrous, but is left-hand dominant, so that works out well. I always grasp papers to be filed on their left-hand side and place then right-hand side down in the filing cabinet. I sit on the left-hand side. When I hang clothes, the hook of the hanger is to the right. I used to have no trouble using regular hand-cranked can openers, but now, they all seem to break. I don’t think it’s my left-handedness. I think it’s poor craftsmanship.
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fantastic put up, very informative. I wonder why the opposite specialists of this sector don’t realize this. You must proceed your writing. I am confident, you have a great readers’ base already!
i find it very hard to use keys,can openers,computer mouse,handing money to people,and so many other things
my left hand is filled with cuts while my right hand looks like its on vacation
by the way i rely like watching cartoon although am 24 years old is it because am lefty?
I have just joined patchwork classes and find that even after being given instructions either verbally or written I seem to get somethings the wrong way round. Then when it is pointed out I seem unable to see where or what the error is! Could this stem from left handed or I do I just lack the skills. I am 60 years old and I know it can be difficult to grasp new skills but even my teacher is now wondering. Do any of you have problems with this?
Fascinating website – I believe I am ambidextrous but that may be just having to adapt in certain circumstances. Fully agree with handbags made the wrong way, belts, passing someone, climbing over things (seems like brain can’t remember!) left handed mother getting my right handed child dressed! I am the only person in my extended family this or ever has been left handed – shame really I could have passed on my knowledge or lack of!
Regards
Veronica
I stteard as a drummer and at breaks would flip the guitar over and fool with it and at 35 was shown some basic chords. OOps I am left handed and the big E is on top. Im not an expert and am continually seeking guitar knowledge. Ive determined that there are many styles and methods for playing. The work comes in when trying to mesh what you know with others, but it can be fun too. Ive been drawing chart boxes backwards for 6yrs now and when I watch videos I use pause rewind alot. The main thing is to keep after it and get the sound right with the video. But creating new sounds is also rewarding. Keep after it.
My son is left handed. He is unable to walk in flip-flops. They either slip off his feet or slide off to the side. When he has tried to wear them he has to squeeze his toes together to hold them on. A friend of mine who is also left handed recently told me that she is also unable to wear flip-flops for similar reasons. Curious if this is a common problem for left handed people. would appreciate any input. Thanks!
Wow! I thought it was just me! The few times that I tried to wear flip flops, I had to hang on to the blasted things so hard with my toes, I got wicked cramps in my calves! What a nightmare! I am also the only lefty out of 7 children. There were a lot of ruined clothes when we were little! No one ever wanted to sit next to me at the dinner table. The ROUND dinner table! My parents finally decided to get a rectangular table!
The flip-flop problem is new to me. I wear them all the time, and I am so left-handed, I’m even left-footed, but no problem with the flip-flops. We’re all SO different even if we are left-handed! And I use the mouse with my right hand , no problem. Work at a public library and have to use the mouse all day!.
When I joined the Navy in Canada the first thing I was asked when I boarded my Ship “Are you right or left handed”. When I said I was left handed I was told to report to the Gunnery Office as Guns Crew even though I was in the Supply Branch.
Well, if you see pictures of old 1950 style Navy Cruisers and Destroyers they have twin guns mounted in a single turret. The left gun is right handed and the right gun (a mirror image) is left handed. I would grab a handle with my right hand and ram the shell into the breech with my left hand, my body stays completely away from the other gun so as not to get hit by the empty casing was it ejects from the left side gun.
Now something else, is there such a thing as a left handed paper cutter?
As a dedicated lefty, I have problems with anything that is screwed on – broom handles,
screwdrivers, mops, even my eyeglasses. Apparently how I take them off undoes the little
screw. I explained to the optometrist that I had to have my glasses fixed four times this year alone – solution was a “lock-tight” screw.
As for corkscrews, my husband took pity on me and bought me an electric one – the push button is in the middle.
Also, instructions for a quilted box pattern, were all for right-handed people – not realizing til frustration set in, the teacher finally told me that I had reverse the pictures for my left hand.
I got a wireless mouse to solve the computer problem.
Not too convinced on some of these posts. I’m a right- hander and I have many of the problems as well. Things like taps, knobs switches etc are symmetrical and just as easy to move both ways. Even right-handers have to turn the tap off!
I’m naturally a lefty but dont find any of these problems. I have learned to adapt to life being left handed and dont think about it. I wonder if its the fact that I am ambidextrous. I eat with my right, can write with my right and when i play sports i just play with whichever hand i pick the racket or cue up with. Maybe all the others leftys of the world need to train themselves to be ambidextrous. Also my boyfriend is a lefty so we aren’t ergonomically challenged. As for navigation, I am one of the best people any knows for directions. If i have been somewhere once I can do it again no problem and i have a photographic memory for maps
I was on vacation in Bath a couple months ago with my family. I’m quite interested in that stuff, but my mother hates museums. She just wanted to get out of there. So we started rushing it a bit. And then we got to a room with two exits. One to the left of us and one to the right. One the right arrow it said like, 300′s-1800′s fashion (something like that) and on the one to the left it said fashion from the 1900′s-2000′s. I went to the left. My mother followed me but after a few minutes she said “You always have to do everything backwards!”
Apparently, people are supposed to go right to see the earlier clothes first. I wasn’t thinking about that. I just went left out of instinct. So my instinct is backwards..? I think she could have phrased it a little better.
I was on vacation in Bath a couple months ago and me and my family went to the fashion museum there. My mother
Yes!!! I totally get it!!! Every time I have to move out of the way for someone, I end up moving the same way, and bumping into them!! It’s so embarasing!!!
I’m relived I’m not the only one who does some of these things, such as being directionally challenged, walking on the left side all the time, or imagining a scene in a book differently than others.
One thing I have done recently is when I was writing a short story for my Litature class is I had one of the main characters lose his arm as a punishment well without thinking I had him lose his right arm because I still wanted him to be some what efficent at his work only later did I realize that most people are right handed and wouldn’t see it that way.
Also in the new book I’m writing, its a fairy novel, anyone with atleast a little fairy blood in them is left handed so almost all my main characters are lefties, partly because it will be a little easier because I won’t have to stop and think oh yeah this person is right handed they wouldn’t normally use their left hand for that, but its mostly because left handed people are just cooler.
Does anyone else have trouble with doors? I always reach for the door knob with my left hand then I try to pull it while walking out and I get all twisted and occasionally hit myself with the door, which I always thought it was because of clumsiness but now idealize it could be because I try to do everything with my left hand and not my right hand.
Sorry not idealize, I ment I realize.
wow… i love reading these comments because I do all of the exact same things!!
Do any UK banks issue land handed cheque books?
Lloyds TSB do left handed cheque books.
I play Badminton and one of the first things I do is look to see which hand my opposition plays with. That way I know what way to play. One of my partners is also a leftie so we usually have the advatage because most people don’t realise. A strange thing the other night though, 3 of the 4 of us playing a match were leftie’s, I’ve never had that happen before. I have asked some of the people I play with or against if they noticed if I was left-handed and mostly they say no.
I am a Grade 9 student in Knights College, Gauteng, South-Africa. I am currently getting ready to participate in the National Science Expo. As I have been doing a substantiate amount of research, I do find very little published material on the impact of how a mother behaves towards her baby, determine handedness. The only theory I have been able to find so far is the way a baby is carried by a mother, which seems to have no substantiation. Can you provide me with your opinions on the following?
1. Do you believe the way a parent dresses their child at birth i.e. pulls the left hand or right hand through first, has an impact on being left or right handed?
2. Do you think there is any link between a parent’s behaviors towards their child at birth that will impact their handedness?
3.
I would really appreciate your feedback.
Marisa vd Westhuizen – Knights College Gr 9
Reply
Lol, no. You can dress or hold a child any way you like, it won’t affect their handedness. It’s a fact that it’s pre-determined in the womb, you are what you are.
I’ve never noticed which hand I put in first when dressing my child, as a baby. I doubt if it was always the same side.
I am a Grade 9 student in Knights College, Gauteng, South-Africa. I am currently getting ready to participate in the National Science Expo. As I have been doing a sustantiate amount of research, I do find very little published material on the impact of how a mother bahaves towards her baby, determine handedness. The only theory I have been able to find so far is the way a baby is carries by a mother, which seems to have no substanitation. Can you provide provide me with your opinions on the following:
1. Do you believe the way a parent dresses their child at birth i.e. pulls the left hand or right hand through first, has an impact on being left or right handed?
2. Do you think there is any link between a parent’s behaviour towards their child at birth that will impact their handedness.
I would really appreciate your feedback.
Marisa vd Westhuizen – Knights College Gr 9
Both my parents are right handed but I’m left handed. My cousin’s case is the same. He’s left handed but both his parents are right handed. I think it runs in the family but it’s irrelevant which hand the parents use. By the way, my daughter is right handed, although I’d have liked it if she had been left handed
When I was under training in the Royal Navy I found I could tie all the knots perfectly initially but had completely forgotten how to do them if I tried to practice later.
It only dawned on me many years later that I was trying to do them left handed.
Another little comment about cash machines, when taking the notes and putting them in my wallet they always go in upside down.
I love reading all these comments. It makes me feel I’m normal to hear all the problems you all have had, as I have had them too.One not mentioned however is the problem with supermarket trolleys.The little gadget that you put your coin in to release the trolley from all the others is nearly always on the right hand side. I get so infuriated with them but absolutely refuse to use my right hand. So I struggle!!
I was pulled up about my writing at grammar school and never forgave the teachers involved. I’m glad there is someone else out there who had the same unpleasant experiences with writing as I had. I really thought I was the only one to have this happen. I have overcome most of the challenges of being a lefty but this one with my writing stays in my memory above all else as being the most unpleasant. (I am now 70 years old.)
This site is so good for me and boosts my morale no end. Keep up the good work.
My husband and I have been married for 40 years and I still stand on the
wrong side for him to open the door for me! It’s got to be a left handed thing!
Just one or two problems I have come across:-
1. Fastener on necklace always on the wrong side
2. When I would greet someone by the shake of their hand, I always naturally gave my left hand.
3. Ornaments always have to be facing from left to right and it just looks odd to me if animals or people in pictures are not facing that way too.
4. On a positive note, my Bank issues left handed cheque books which is fantastic. No right handed person I know appreciated my problem with a right handed cheque book until I hand them my cheque book to look at then they’re the ones with the problem, great!
In my old flat I had the kitchen completely re-done and I did the design myself. I didn’t realise until someone pointed it out, but I had designed it all left-handed. The kitchen was one of the best I have worked in with all the things in the right (‘left’) places. The design included a really cool tall drawer to the left of the cooker for olive oil bottles. I had wondered at the time why it had to be reworked especially for the kitchen! Sadly we sold the flat. I wonder how the person who bought it is getting on in my kitchen! Now I have to design the kitchen in our new house. I am so looking forward to it.
And yes, I have a left handed breadknife and a universal chopping knife – wonderful inventions.
Three things stand out for me over the years. One was a set of books I have where no matter how hard I tried I always found after putting them on the shelf in the correct order I would look at my efforts to find I had gone from right to left.
I worked in a supermarket a long time ago in the days when you “touch typed” the prices in. Trouble was the conveyor belt was on the left hand side, and so my speed was a lot slower as I either had to think through what I was doing and effectively look at everything my right hand did, as I couldn’t “trust it” to type in the right price or do everything with my left hand.
The last thing relates to my grandmother who was born at the turn of the last century, and who I can remember vividly standing with a loaf of bread firmly clasped to her chest and cutting a slice towards herself. She told of being beaten with a metal ruler if she used her left hand at school.
On a positive note I would like to thank my primary school headteacher and handwriting teacher, who despite it being in the 60′s insisted that both my brother and I were taught to write beautifully with our left hands and without any awkward curl of the hand around the pen or paper.
I am the mother of a lefty and really have to think when showing him things. Especially using sisscors. Also when helping him to dress I always expected him to step into his shorts right foot first and have really had to change my habits. Also very interesting about the glider pilots as my child can do much better turns to the right when skiing and is often told to pracise his left turns. Don’t ever remember my other child who is a rightie being asked to practise her right turns!
Loving this club as a rightie myself it really helps open my mind to the challenges my leftie child has.
I am loving reading all the comments about daily trials and tribulations of lefties. It is great to be one on the “in” crowd. I recently purchased (through this site of course) left handed pens and am absolutely loving it. Recently someone asked to borrow my pen and returned it with much grumbling about how uncomfortable it was to use. (hee hee). Another huge revelation for me was the left handed scissors. I have spent my whole like feeling like I couldn’t cut in a straight line to save my life. Now that I have left handed scissors I have discovered I am miraculously cured!!!
I encourage, even urge you parents to have your left-handed children sit on the left side of the classroom, and please share this with your child’s teachers.
Whilst training as a hairdresser I found it very difficult to learn ‘how to’ by watching the lecturer. I discovered by looking in the mirror, which reversed the demonstration, I could see how to do things. Works like magic when learning new practicle skill! I have always found doing up buttons on ladies clothes confusing, opening a can with opener difficult & using potato peeler impossible.
I hate the fact that if something is the left-handed way, righties describe it as the ‘wrong’ way. It’s not ‘wrong’ its left!
Anyway, I’m a receptionist and I realised today that laminators are right-handed as the buttons are placed strategically for righties dominant hand. The most awkward thing at work, though, is ‘phones as the handset is on the left, and the buttons are on the right, so when you pick the phone up with your right hand in order to leave your left hand free to write, you get the wire crossed, especially if you have to then transfer a call and use the buttons!
More and more people are left handed, so why aren’t more and more things made for us by default??
Anyway, getting off my soapbox and going home!
I have a patented invention for a right handed ignition and left handed ignition. It is on the internet and I’d love to have someone make the prototype to get this invention made. My patented invention is patent numberUS 6,723, 934, B2 Date of patent April 20, 2004. I have used my left hand to turn the key in my car ignition since getting my driver’s permit and license and due to a birth injury do not have the strength in my right hand to turn the key in the car, so I have always used my left hand to turn on a car ignition. I’d love to speak to serious engineers, mechanics or individuals who love cars, etc. If I can get the invention made, licensensed and sold, I’d discuss royalties, etc. I wish I could apply to be on the Shark Tank show on US TV. I am the sole owner of my patented ignition invention in the USA and can be reached at mbenr@aol.com or you may leave a message at 617-469-3117. Thank you, Marybeth
Personally, I never had a problem learning to tie laces or anything else where the teacher was opposite me. I just mirrored it (like any good lefty) and all was succesful. The same applied when I learned to play a guitar by watching a DVD tutorial demonstrated by a right handed player.
P.S. Anyone come across a left handed microwave yet?
I had to laugh. Having just finished reading the leftie problem (not to me), I was watching the Cricket Test Match between Englad & Sri Lanka. Cook, Left handed & Trott, Right handed almost ran into each other & they take runs together on A REGULAR BASIS.
My husband has given up on me. The mouse on our computer desk is permanently on the left hand side.
I have problems with neckace clasps. The pendant is always strung so that the fiddly hook to open is in your right hand, and the simple circular end is in your left hand. Not a problem when the pendant is loose and you can re-thread it so it sits the ‘left’ way around. However on necklaces where it is fixed, the fastenings have to stay the ‘right’ way. I’ve even bought and fitted new clasps for necklaces sometimes if they are really tricky. The bigger ones I can do with right or left hand but the smaller ones get the better of me many times.
How true for me too, I never thought of that, my big thing (for some reason) is lacing shoes the same.
I had this problem until i discovered if you put the necklace on backwards, the clasp then is in your left hand. Then turn the necklace around after you have fastened it.
I put the pendant at the back of my neck, this way I have the circle on the right. Once done I turn the pendant forward
After reading the majority of comments i think that us left handed people just adapt to a right handed world without realising. As a child my first recognition of being different apart from writing was learning to tell the time, i was brought a timex watch that you had to wind up manually and initially i put it on my right wrist as it felt comfortable but i struggled to wind it up so ended up wearing on my left wrist and have always worn a watch on my left ever since but it causes problems as i scratch them often and bang them on desks etc. Magazines i tend to read backwards turning pages with right hand to keep left hand free. I worked in a bank and although you just cope with a right handed world as soon as i got a left handed cheque book how easy and natural that was before i even knew it was a left handed cheque book. I use a mouse in my right hand but it makes my hand ache after a while. And some things i still dont know how to do as in golf i have no idea how to hold a club as i have never played. I find when using right handed implements my elbows tend to be in the air ie can opener which i struggle with always have. The list goes on so i will stop there ty for reading this.
My friends find my way of ticking things absolutely hilarious and it’s always a topic of conversation when they see me ticking things! I am fairly used to most of the right handed ways I think and have never used anything that has been made for left handers even though I use my left hand for almost everything bar the computer mouse (so I can use a mouse and write at the same time, which has it’s advantages).
Also when I was learning to drive, my driving instructor said that most people had difficulty turning right whereas I had no problem at all. I didn’t realise that this was probably due to my left handedness until reading that pilot statement Sarah made in the post.
I like that I have to open a fridge or a cupboard with my right hand because I can leave it resting on the door and take whatever I need with my left hand and then can close it without having to move my right hand at all (whereas righties would have to use their right hand to take things out etc and to close the fridge/cupboard door).
This is an article I found about “lefties” What do you think?
The Week
May 2011
Surprising facts about left-handed people
Human beings have been predominantly right-handed for more than 500,000 years, according to new research done by anthropologist David Frayer. Yet 10 to 12 percent of people prefer using their left hand — and scientists continue to probe the differences between that group and the right-handed majority, often with surprising results. Here, a look at five ways lefties are different than righties:
They’re more affected by fear
In one recent experiment, lefties who watched an eight-minute clip from the film Silence of the Lambs exhibited more symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder than did their right-handed counterparts. That may be because the right side of the brain, which is dominant in lefties, is more involved in the fear response, according to Dr. Carolyn Choudhary of Queen Margaret University in Edinburgh, as quoted in The Telegraph.
They’re angrier
Left-handed and ambidextrous people are more susceptible to negative emotions, including anger. A small study published last year in the Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease found that the brains of lefties process emotions differently than those of righties, with more communication between the brain’s two halves. As a result, the areas that produce negative emotions experience greater activity, according to the Daily Mail. Then again, maybe lefties are just “more angry because the world is designed for the right-handed majority,” says John Cloud in TIME.
They’re more inhibited
That emotional wiring also may explain why righties tend to charge ahead, while lefties “tend to dither,” according to behavioral psychologist Lynn Wright, as quoted in NewScientist. A study performed by Wright at Abertay University in Scotland found that lefties were more restrained and more worried about making mistakes.
They associate “left” with good
Most people tend to have positive associations with the concept of “right” and bad associations with “left.” Lefties are the opposite. In a recent study, Stanford researcher Daniel Casasanto asked participants to draw a zebra in a box that best represented good things, while depicting a panda in a box that would befit the bad. Right-handed people tended to position the zebra on the right side of a box, while lefties put it on the left. That shows that left-handed people “implicitly” believe “good stuff is on the left and bad stuff is on the right,” Casasanto says, as quoted by the Stanford Report, despite so many signals from language and culture “telling them the exact opposite.”
They may have an advantage in politics
Casasanto’s conclusions could actually favor left-handed politicians, at least in televised events like debates, says Jocelyn Rousey in Mediaite. Casasanto found that politicians tend to accompany statements they see as positive by gesturing with their dominant hands. When a rightie uses his dominant hand to give a thumbs-up, television viewers — who see the image flipped — see him gesture on the left side of their screen. The left-handed, meanwhile, “appear to be putting things in a much more positive light for the 90 percent of viewers who are right-handed.”
Most of the comments , I can identify with, one problem similiar to the cork screw one is, I always tighten the jar lids rather than screw them off, sometimes I think I even talk backwards it thats possible. like give all the details and then give the subject, left handedness is a strange world to live in.
Am I weird, reading through alot of comments many I agree with, I am seriously left-handed/sided at times, but I had to stop and think. I am very creative, artistic etc and wonder if this has anything to do with my ability to ‘adapt’ in certain situations where the need to use or think ‘right-handed’ occurs. Is there anyone else out there that is very artistic or creative is it an ability unique to our type. I have become so good I have friends who have known me for years, that only realize I am left-handed when they see me WRITE. There is one thing I really do struggle with though and that is BOTTLE TOPS and ANYTHING THAT HAS TO BE SCREWED SHUT, in or down, my makeup bag is testamont to that. Plus using a screw driver is a nightmare so thank heavens for power drivers.
I can relate to the belt comments – I rarely wear them. And just a couple of days ago I was at a conference and went the same direction as one of my colleagues for the goodbye kiss. Was a bit awkward! I had never thought of this as a lefty thing though.. I live in Italy and I never seem to have problems here with the kissing. I have noticed it in Spain and Greece so I thought perhaps it was a cultural difference that they go to the other side..?
In one of my classes at school and more recently at a conference, the room was set up with chairs that have fold-down desks on them. But they were ALL right-handed. The desk swings down from the right and doesn’t extend round enough to be comfortably used by a lefty. I ended up just resting my notepad on my knee.
The Rome metro has ticket barriers that you are supposed to feed the ticket through on the right and walk through. When I first moved here I always instinctively fed the ticket in with my left hand and then wondered why the barrier in front of me hadn’t opened. Now on approaching the barriers I have to cross my left arm across my body and then sort of walk through sideways (feeding it through with my right hand just doesn’t work for me at all!!)
Cash points are often awkward and require crossing my left arm over to put the card in, insert pin etc.
Now I’ve got thinking about it I’m sure I’m going to start thinking of more and more!!
I have to agree with you about cash machines. The new ones are even worse to use, they are still on the right hand side but the left hand side of the slot for you card has a huge lip covering covering it ( a bit like a golf ball split in half ) and I am sure my bank card is getting damaged as I almost twist it as I struggle to get it out of the machine!
Having read all the comments I think I’m the first to mention this so I’m intrigued if others have ever noticed it!
A few months ago I was at a museum in Barcelona and after wandering round for a while, I realised that the pictures I was looking at were ordered chronologically.. except I was going the wrong way (I only realised because at one point there were three pictures that were supposed to follow on from each other like a story and the one I saw first didn’t make sense to me). Having realised this, I then noticed that I was walking against the tide… everyone else was approaching the paintings from the left.. whereas I was walking the room anticlockwise.
I have only just associated this with possibly being left handed after reading your message. I always find myself going the opposite way up the aisles in a supermarket to the general flow of the general public, If I bump into someone I know I continually bump into them throughout my trip. Is this left handedness manifesting itself????
Iv been told when i play cards of any kind i lay them down backwards i don’t think i do but i guess i do in the eyes of a right handed person.
I am always in trouble at the bridge table – my card are always the wrong way round when I am dummy and the bidding cards are a pain in the …. Besides bing on the WRONG side they are also gradusted for right-handers and I am always knocking my opponents cards off the table!!!!!
how about opening and closing taps???? A Total nightmare!!!!!!
Ya I appaerently according to my right handed family deal cards the wrong direction only my leftie cousin got it, its just easier to go the other way.
I just recently noticed this, still being in high school. Passing papers (like when a teacher hands a stack out to the class) has always been awkward for me. The teacher will always subconsciously give the pile to the right side of a row, usually being right-handed and wanting to keep the bigger stack in their own dominant hand. Once it gets to me, I’ll take my paper with my dominant (left) hand, then do an awkward cross-over move where I pass to the left with my right hand. That, or I’ll have to put my paper down and pass with my left, which still feels awkward. Does anyone else have that problem, or at least had it in their school years, or am I just a rare case of extreme left-handedness?
I have a few gripes with the righties, they simply do not get it. I now refuse to carve the roast meat due to comments like, ‘you’ve done it backwards’ and ‘you make it look so awkward’. Another one is bicycle brakes, I always use the wrong lever and end up doing myself a bit of damage in the pubic region thanks to the gooseneck. I can never give directions without stuffing it up, I know which way I mean but my brain just doesn’t get it to my mouth in time. My lever-arch file at high school was upside down and backwards, I had to put instructions on the cover so you knew which way to read it. Glad I am not alone with all this, I have my fellow lefties who also endure these sufferances. We are always in our right minds anyway. Thanks Guys.
I have what is called “mixed laterality”. Which means I am left handed but right eyed (most people are left handed left eyed or right handed right eyed) I discovered this at forty and has explained why I am so clumsy and awkward. I never know which leg to kick a ball with, climbing over a fence is a nightmare as I have to wait while my brain works out which leg to lead with.
Just thought of another one. I recently went on a Makaton signing course. You are taught to sign using your dominant hand. The lady teaching us was left-handed so for all the right-handed people on the course they just mirrored what she was doing without having to think about it but for the other left-handed person on the course and me we had to concentrate extra hard to do the signs the right way round for us!
I have tried to learn ASL (American Sign Language) and find it almost impossible. I thought it had something to do with me but after reading your comment I realized it was because I was doing all the difficult maneuvers with my left hand and needed to do them with my right hand.
Fascinating reading. Do get yourselves a left-handed bread knife if you haven’t already got one. At a conference/lecture/meeting I always sit myself at the end of a row on the left to avoid elbowing people – also in a Chinese restaurant if chopsticks are involved! Reading all the comments about belts another annoying one is hairslides which end up upside down in your hair! My biggest current problem is my lawnmower as it requires you to hold down a button and press on a lever at the same time and surprise surprise they are on the right. I end up with hand ache as I find it hard to do with my right hand!
Not only lawnmowers but have you noticed it with strimmers!! very bad hand ache!
After reading this, I realized my children are always scalding themselves and dumping water all over when they try to pour water from my kettle for a reason. I keep it on my stovetop pointing toward the right so I can easily tip it with my left hand. I’ll have to tell them to turn it the other way first.
One of the most fun things I had was a left-handed corkscrew. I would hand it to my right-handed friends to open a bottle and they would get so frustrated trying to figure out why it wouldn’t work. I would finally show them what the problem was and then tell them that, now, they knew what it was like to be in an opposite handed world. Unfortunately, one of them broke it and I haven’t replaced it yet…but I plan to soon.
Oh good lord I kissed my BOSS’S mum! smack on the lips at her 60th birthday in front of a table full of people including my boss!
Righties in a left handed world!
I’ve always been frustrated by retractable knives, because the thumb press to push out the blade is on the “finger” side of the knife when I use it. Irritating, but I adapt by either turning it over and pushing out the blade then turning it back or using my fingers to move the blade in and out. Last week I found a knife that I could make into a left handed knife and now I don’t even have to think about adjusting the blade – it’s just there as I need it.
I loaned my knife to my right-handed boss today and he couldn’t figure out how to use it for a good 30 seconds. I had to take it back from him and retract the blade for him once he was done. Ahahahaha, that was fun!
I bought a left handed can opener from anything left-handed last year and forgot that it was for left handed use because it’s just perfect for me. My sister visited a few months ago, and I heard from the kitchen – “Aurgh! This can opener is useless!” – welcome to my world kiddo.
I think righties have more trouble with the bread/bun plate. The correct position for bread is to the LEFT of your plate. I find if I let the right-handed person to my left choose first, they always go for my food. I do steal their drinks in retaliation though – it should be mine.
Everyone in my family apparently eats backward, all the lefties use the knife in their right hand, because the fork has the more difficult job of stabbing, aiming for the mouth, etc…. and all the righties have to switch their fork and knife around from the place-setting setup because they aim their forks with their right hands. We are about 25% left handed in my extended family.
I remember the first time I cooked in my Aunt’s kitchen – it’s setup for a leftie. It took me about half an hour to realize something was wrong – everything was where it should be. The drawers with knives are to the left of the cutting board, the dishwasher is to the left of the sink, the fridge opens the ‘right’ way around – I was so used to having to cross in front of myself to reach for stuff in my mom’s kitchen, it was a revelation!
Wow. Left and right. I tell the person that I am with at the time, if I tell you to go left and I am pointing to the right, go to right. If I tell you to go right and point to the left, go to the left.
i do that and i’m right handed, so that isn’t being left handed, that’s being female brained.
My main problem is with the purse I have at the moment. I put notes in at the back then have to turn it the other way up or my coins all land on the floor! I also have trouble with North, South, East and West, but also with horizontal and vertical. I have to picture the horizon to get that one sorted! Cutlery when eating out is always a problem, especially if the table is round! On a rectangular table you can look at an end and work it out from there. I thought I was weird feeling uncomfortable on the right side of the bus – wonderful to know I’m not the only one! So many comments I identify with – look for ward to reading more.
I suggest finding a good seamstress and having the pockets popped off and switched around, if the design of the bag makes that possible. If that wont work, you could have an entire bag custom made.
What about the butter dish? I always turn it around to use it, and the rest of my family gets mad at me.
When I put the cuttlery away in the draw I put it in opposite to the rest of my family (they are all righties). When I get cuttlery out of the drawer if other members of my family have put it away then I have to contourt myself to pick it up without touching the eating end. Aaaarrrgghhh
I am extremely left side dominant. I have lots of problems with internal visualization. I will read a poem in a book, for instance, and remember that it on the left side page. I am certain and can visualize it clearly.
Except it is really on the right side. My brain tends to flip info when it is given two identical left/right choices. As an apt. manager, I must be present when maintenance is begun on an apt., to confirm that is is indeed the correct destination, and that I haven’t accidentally sent them to the apt. across the hall.
When I give directions to a well known destination, I will often verbalize the wrong direction, although I know the correct way to go—I resort to pointing when possible. If it is not a well known destination, I will flip the visual info also, especially if I read it on a map!
I gave up trying to dance long ago; am thankful that another writer talked about beginning on the left vs right foot—now I know why “just dance” on the Wii is so hard!
Ticket barriers on the Tube even after years of using them usuallt lead to lots of shuffling of bags and crossing of arms, I just can’t seem to learn to take the oyster card out of my bag with in my Right hand!
I was going to comment about the Rome metro! You have to feed in the ticket to the right hand side of the barrier and go through. Until I got used to it I was always feeding to my left and wondering why the barrier in front of me wasn’t opening! I would then have to go round to the other side, blocking everyone else coming up behind me.
I always when shaking hands with opponents at the start of a golf match appologise for shaking hands with a glove on. Yesterday was great three of us were left handed and one right, for the first time we took the micky out of him for being “Kack handed” give him his due he took it in good heart!
I am also a ‘truly dominant’ leftie and proud of it. I have searched back through generations of my family and can find no-one else even remotely leftie. As a child in unenlightened times I was considered ‘slow’ awkward and clumsy by my teachers who tried to force me to write with the ‘correct’ hand by constantly hitting me sharply across the knuckles of my left hand, which I persisted in using. I can remember the day my dad personally intervened at the school and the ‘punishment’ eventually stopped – but I still have the scars on my left hand and I am now 62! Trying to write with pen and ink were always a nightmare at school (in those days) as your hand would brush over the newly written, wet ink and smudge the words, also the ink would not flow smoothly through the nibs which would then spray and blot over the page and scratch and impale the paper.
Like so many leftie contributors, I have always found it challenging to live in a rightie- dominated world with the need to adapt to tools, implements, structures and even cultural customs all designed for use in a right-handed society. As I have grown older and more ‘inventions’ and technologies have appeared, it is still surprising that so little acknowledgement is made to our percentage of the population at the planning stage. Academic success proved that I am not somehow ‘challenged’ just because it is often difficult to have to do most things ‘back-to-front’ utilising inappropriate equipment. Indeed, we lefties are obviously very resourceful and we seem to incorporate a sense of humour in our temperament, which comes in useful every time I walk into the plate glass of the revolving door, collide with turnstiles, try to push or pull open doors at the hinge side or insert my underground ticket at the automatic barrier and then try to walk through on the side which has not opened because the ticket reader is always located on the ‘right’ wrong side!
I can really identify with all that you said, Sylvia! I too am a dominent leftie, but unlike you I had a grandmother who was obviously left handed. Although it was obvious she was left-handed as she wielded a bread knife (some said dangerously) in her left hand, the bread facing in the opposite direction from others and using a “left-handed potato peeler”, she wrote with her right hand. She had been subject to punishment for writing with her left hand too, but had been forced to succumb to using her write hand, against her instincts. I am sure that it was her influence over my mother, a rightie, that allowed me to develop my natural handedness – but not without some struggles, especially at school. I am a few years behind you (5) and was never rapped on the knuckles for writing with my left hand, but I too learned to write with a nib and ink – oh what a nightmare! My work was similarly blotched and I constantly dragged my hand through the newly written work, smudging it. Consequently (no logic here!) I was the last person in my class to be permitted to write with a ball point pen (which actually improed the quality of my penmanship).
It has only been through reading some of the observations posted by others that I have realized how many things I have just adapted to without realizing, as you indicated! I used the mouse buttons on my computer mouse for years before I realized it was backwards and they could be set to accomodate lefties! I tried swapping them around, but it was too late, I can happily function with my fingers operating backwards. I now have an ergonomic mouse that operates with my hand oriented sideways and love it. I have found that certain professions seem to attract a high percentage of left-handers – for example, more that 50% of the professional geologists I know (and I am one of them) are left-handed. Several other science and mathematically oriented professions also have a higher than expected percentage of lefties and none of these folks are mentally “challenged”, except by having to deal with an often “upside down and backwards” world!
Thank you for sharing all these comments. As an ironic side note, my right handed husband’s mother and both children, and several grandchildren are lefties, so he is the one that adapts in our world!
There’s an official campaign by the german trade chamber, (Handwerkskammer), and the union of metal work employers, (Bundesverband Metall), which is called Simon, the left hand of crafts, (Simon, die linke Hand des Handwerks), showing a lefty in several situations, who is too clumsy to work as a craftsman. The campaigns banner shows a left hand with bandaged thumb. (www.handwerkskammer.de).
The question is: Why is the left thumb of the lefty bandaged? Did he use his clumse right hand and hit his left thumb with a hammer? My mysterious fellow countrymen will probable never explain that to me.
Well, what ever, more lefty tools for craftsmen would make us looking less clumsy.
But I believe, I would still hit my right thumb while working with a hammer.
Best wishes, Frank
am always proud to be a lefty but at times i look odd in the midst of people, i find it very hard to use a pair of scissors to cut a paper or a piece of cloth, each time i try to, my aunt always says it is because i am a lefty, also in making or receiving phone calls i always use my left ear, infact i don’t feel comfortable using my right ear to makeor receive phone calls. people look at me with a strange look each time i give or collect anything with my left hand, is it really bad to use the left hand in giving or taking anything?
That’s going to make things a lot eeasir from here on out.
When at school, we boys having school dinner took turns to lay the tables for about 200 boys. When my turn came I laid the whole dining hall as being left handed. Everybody moaned and i was never asked again
HEE HEE ! :-@
What a therapeutic read!
Here’s one that has been very conspicuous over the years:
From the outset of our mixed-hand marriage, we have had problems when we share the task of folding a big item ….. sheet, duvet, blanket, tent etc… Right-hander and left-hander naturally work in opposite ways…. This can be sooooooo frustrating….. and soooooooooooo comical!
Since being an adult I tick and write just how I want.
I have the binded edge of a notebook on the right and its great not battles with the centre anymore.
I recently took some notes in ‘my book’ at a meeting and due to an achey wrist a ‘righty’ took over in my book it caused confusion.
I also think I ‘made’ my daughter left handed by giving everything to her left; she is a very ‘awkward’ left hander. She writes with her left and thats about it everything else – parts her hair, eats, kicks, bats, gives, takes etc is with her right.
The biggest problems I have are with utensils… especially knives! Everyone I know things I’m stupid because I can’t use a bread knife without squashing the bread to bits, and they call me crazy when I insist that knives are made for right-handed people! It isn’t until I actually show them the serrations in the knives that they even start to believe me!
Also, I too have had filing problems. When I was in highschool I would help file other students’ work and their papers would always be backwards when I got done. Eventually I stopped filing papers and found other ways to help.
Finally, one of my most embarrassing lefty moments was with a pair of scissors. My basketball team won a tournament and we each got to cut down part of the net. Each girl stepped up and quickly snipped her part. Of course, when I got up there it took me almost 5 minutes just to sever the net! I was SO embarrassed.
Oh Sarah get youself a left handed bread knife it is the best kitchen utensil I have brought.
And then I revel when my right handed husband picks it up by mistake and struggles and of course then ………………. I have to show him how to cut it ‘properley’. lol
WOW! Does this ever bring back memories -Belts – yes! I haven’t worn a belt for years! – Receipt to sign – yes. – chip card in backwards – yes! – This is one I never thought about: the hugging – my nose hits the other person’s. I just thought I was awkward. – can opener – thought I was inept and uncoordinated; the same with revolving doors.
Have always wanted to sit on the left in a theater or classroom. Yes, it is very awkward when sitting beside someone in a classroom OR at a table when eating. I always want to sit at the very end on the left so my elbow does not bump anyone’s. I get confused when I go in any big shopping mall and want to go out the wrong way from where I came in. When I am going to park in a big parking lot to go shopping, I park just to the left of the exit so that I can remember where I have parked. I actually learned to use the mouse on the right side of the computer because that’s where it was but I now have it on my left side. DO YOU KNOW that when the keyboard was made for typewriters, it was made so that the left hand was used more than the right? I read that somewhere. It was done to slow down the typists. I can’t remember why.
I’ve had many of the same problems. When I was little I was told “You write with your right hand.” Not me specifically, but people in general. I thought you basically had a “write” hand and the other hand. I didn’t know it had to do with directionality. So when I got to school I didn’t know my left from my right, and still many decades later, have the same problem. I slant my paper as righties do when I write (so I essentially write upside down, as someone described it; I don’t have the left hook) because I looked around the classroom and saw that’s the way everyone else had their paper slanted.
Not only am I left-handed, but I’m also mildly dyslexic. So I confound people who come into my home “office”. My books are arranged right to left on the bookshelf (first book in a series is farthest to the right) and my icons on my computer are all on the right side. (although, for some reason, I can’t use a left-handed mouse)
I had a problem with compass directions when I was first learning them, but did finally overcome that. I amuse my right handed friends because, although I don’t know my left from my right, I do know port from starboard.
I also carry a shoulder bag on my right shoulder. That makes them zip closed to the back (pickpocket’s delight) rather than to the front, or else the part that should be on the outside is against my hip.
I do share the same problems. I have come to find out that not only am I left handed but left side dominate because my contact prescription has now change. I have had the same prescription in both eyes for the longest time but now the left eye is doing more work and is slightly weaker.
The trunk on my car I always turn the key left which leaves it stuck for moment because it is suppose to be turned right some problem with most locks.
I had to teach myself how to use chop sticks because no one else could but yet I can teach a right handed person how to use them.
Even when I type, my left hand does most of the work when using a keyboard. But I think because of the computer and my smartphone my left had might become weak over time from over use.
I have notices the atm’s are right handed too but the door access can be on any side. I tend to swipe my card in stores upside down.
I thought I couldn’t keep my bag on my left shoulder because I have scoliosis but it seems it might be a little bit of both.
I have to grab my beer or my drink with my left hand because it just doesn’t feel right in my right hand.
Also the same problem with clothes and belts. I don’t think they had a problem teaching me how to tie my shoe.
When I use a knife or any sharp object at my dad’s he doesn’t trust me because I’m left handed or probably because it just looks wrong to him.
It was so easy when I first learned how to drive to park on the left side of the street, the right side took some time.
Whatever I feel I can’t do I tend to something different change things around to cater to me.
Hey lets not feel sorry for ourselves because at the end of the day we are very unique and we are shaping the world to be more accepting of use and our uniqueness.
I to have had bother being the only leftie in a right handed home .. I learnt to watch others to tie my shoes and knit .. some pattens I can’t do .. I can’t read the line backwrds as some one once told me … taken me long enough to read lines like every one else does .
Hubby has to leave the kitchen when I am cutting anything as his head can’t cope with me cutting some thing the wrong way …
I work on a till… in a supermarket and ended up with frozen shoulder because was working left handed .. I now have to juggle the change to give with right hand … left won’t reach some people who are already on their way out the door… LOL
Ticks are done the wrong way to every one else ,but right for me .. been nice seeing other people suffer the same as me .. shaking hands is not some thing I like doing as always the left one … still makes people laugh so don’t mind .. Caz
My husband finds his wardrobe disrupted when I hang his clothes in it, they are the opposite way to his! My daughters have trouble machine sewing if I have pinned the garment for them. Just recently I took up quilting and found it most difficult to use the rotary cutter.It was all back to front for me.
Recently my new hairdresser asked me whether I was left handed, I answered in the affirmative and asked why, she replied your hair should be parted on the left and it is parted on the right. She asked permission to change it and ever since my hair has been so much easier to manage. I recently found out that my mother used the right parting as she wanted nothing to do with “left things” even though it was the way the hair wanted to go so now after 72 years the parting is where nature intended it to be (my mother was from the age where everything “left ” was not “right”
Is it just me or does every lefty experience this? Every time I use a certain kitchen tool, particularly a knife, my mom feels the need to intervene and show me how to cut properly because she feels that I am not doing it ”right” going along with the expression, ”you and that left hand”. Granted I do struggle a bit, but I do get the job done and its not my fault I can’t cut the way a right handed person would. Kitchen knives and other tools are made for right handed people. Once I explained this to her, she quickly got the picture, and let me cut my way, ”the right way”.
Oh Brittney get youself a lefthanded bread knife it is the best kitchen utensil I have brought.
And then I revel when my right handed husband picks it up by mistake and struggles and of course then ………………. I have to show him how to cut it properley. lol
While on holiday, I went into a cybercafe to check on my messages. All the computers where next to each other with a mouse pad glued to the table between each one.
I moved my mouse to the left and configured it to click left. As time went on the cafe filled up a guy came and sat to my left and insisted that I had taken his mousepad. I pointed out that I had been there first and so the pad was mine. Management came, but obviously I refused to budge. Infact I stayed longer that I really needed to just to make a point.
Things could have been remedied had they not glued the pads down, to reposistion the other pad.
I had never thought about suspended files, and as I’m the one at home that does all the paper work i get cross with my husband for putting the papers back in the files upside down. I’ll be more understanding now. He can’t help being right handed. We work great together at DIY We get to work on a room and finish in the middle. Yin yang
When I fold mixtures of cranberries, nuts, cinnamon, and other items for use in a home-made granola, I have taken the spatula and folded the items into the mix “backwards” as some people say.
This also happens when I take cookie mixture from a bowl and spoon it onto a cookie sheet. I just make allowances for this and put the cookie sheets on the “opposite” side before putting the dough on the sheet.
When using a mixer to mix eggs, flour, sugar, etc., when I use a spatula to keep the mixture off of the side of the mixing bowl, I feel somewhat awkward because this procedure is best done with the right hand. I still accomplish the job even though I do it left-handed.
I took on signing for the deaf for a short period of time – stopping because everyone was confused, including myself – how do the deaf get on reading left handed signers?
However, I do find that teaching guitar right handed is the ideal way as the left hand does some quite deft work on the neck. In teaching music I stick to the ‘right handed’ way – I have yet to see a piano devised for left handers – and I don’t have the resources to try unfortunately – how revolutionary that would be!
I work in a school for the deaf. I was told to sign whichever way was comfortable for me. Deaf people can read in either direction. The thing is to be consistent. I did have a problem when I was learning sign language because we had to sign something without voice or moving our lips and everyone in the class said I was using signs they hadn’t learned. The teacher thought it was funny, but assured them I was using the same signs they were. The only one who understood me was the one deaf woman in the class. The teacher (who was my second sign teacher — my first was actually left-handed) let the class know that I was just signing left-handed.
I actually end up interchanging my hands when signing! I started off signing with only my left hand, but as most of my teachers were righties, I got confused doing the mirror image of them. I can only do the alphabet with my left hand though
Also, because there are fewer lefties around, I find it difficult to read another person’s signs if they’re done with the left hand. Oops.
I constantly have to think about which way to turn keys, door handles, corkscrews, taps, screwtop lids but oddly enough use right handed scissors and tin openers (in my right hand) with no problem. I also vacuum right handed for some reason.
Left to loosen, is the quote I was given. So to undo anything, go left. I do a lot of things right handed, and I think for a good crossover balance of the brain I think we should attempt to do more right handed things. I found I couldn’t get a Sudoku puzzle out so I tried using my right hand for the numbers and wahoo – it came out – just to prove that some sides of the brain need sharpening up. I can now do them left handed as I have now triggered that skill.
I found tightening and untightening bolts an absolute nightmare. Then a friend of mine taught me a very aseful phrase. Righty tighty, Lefty loosey.
I have the same problem with screw top jars, screws, some taps (like the main taps under a sink that turn off the water for each tap; I never know when it stops if its fully on, or fully off!) I have an awkward time at public transport barriers; having to reach accross to put the ticket in. I don’t have trouble with scizzors. I own lefty ones, but have no troble with using right ones in the right hand. The same with can openers. I do have a “propper” one, though I don’t use it much.
I learnt to organise folders from back to front, and it took me years to work out why my ticks looked funny, as I was doing them the right handed way. I have changed that now.
With most other things I just do it with the hand that is easier.
I don’t even have a shoulder(left or right)to cry on. I’m an American “senior”, born a lefty, but coerced by my 1st grade teacher to write with my right hand; I still write with my right hand, but everything else is lefty. The upside down belt was a challenge for me during my time in the United States Marine Corps, circa 1943-1946. Our “dress” blouses were wool, forsest green, secured by a 2 1/2″ Sam Brown leather belt. Getting it right side up came naturally, after a few good “sessions” with my Drill Instructer. The discipline in our Marine Corps is not unlike that of the Royal Marines. When my wife was alive, she often helped me with the “drink/bread? situation. My greatest problem has always been the scissors, how frustrating! A member commented about difficulty with the water faucet, and, if I may, I want to share with you my late-wife’s wisdom, as it relates to faucets(this may be reversed in the UK) “Lefty-Loosy; Righty Tighty” Is this a fetish of some kind? Whenever I walk into a restaurant of about 50 or more customers, I can immediately spot a “lefty” eating. True. When I am asked why that is so, I can only speculate that the left arm, left hand motion stands starkly against all the right handers. I am speaking to “Beckie”, but my comments pertain to each and every leftie out there: She said “A lot of people out there don’t know how our brain works, but we do” Good for you, Beckie. Now, here is my point – this is the time and this is the place – Someone, like Beckie, will become our organizer, and from that point, Beckie will have to identify each of us, as being authentic Lefties; We each sign letters of Authentication, submit them to Beckie. She will then, at our expense, travel to the World Court, Hague(?) and formally present our Demand that the entire world be rightfully returned to all Left Handed peoples, and to their Governing Body, yet to be formalized. Here’s my long-held theory: We are the only peoples on earth, who are in their right mind. Peace of cake!!! Beckie, can we pull this off? Don’t answer that.
My left-handedness is a left eye dominant, so I’m more left sided than left handed. No one is quite sure where the left-handedness came from, as no one remembers a left handed ancestor, but my brother is also left-handed. There were no specialty items as we were growing up, so we learned to work in a right handed world. I don’t remember having problems with using scissors, and use the same scissors right handed people do, just with my left hand. The cut, I gather, is at a different slant, which doesn’t usually make any difference. The only serious problem I have had over the years has been with guitars; I have to have them “Hendrix” strung (and that’s another problem as Paul McCartney was a famous leftie before Hendrix, so why aren’t they called McCartney strung). There were problems when I wanted to learn to knit and crochet, so my right handed mother and grandmother gave up and got me “how to” books. I figured it right out, even though the books were written for right handed people. The biggest problem is that right handed people are convinced they can’t possibly teach a leftie how to do any sort of hand movement activity, not that a leftie can’t learn how to do it from a rightie.
I’m fairly left dominant, but learned the social movements at such an early age I don’t automatically reach or move to the left. When passing I always move to the right, can hold a glass and drink properly from it in either hand, and as long as I don’t have to take notes I can hold the phone in either hand. So glad we got rid of the dial on phones, though, as I had trouble dialing a number with my right hand, the movement of the dial seemed all wrong with my right hand, and I could only dial with my left. (Righties said the same thing with trying to use their left hand, go figure.)
Punch ladles, though …. thank heavens many now come out with the pour notch on both sides. I wasn’t very good at turning it to the left with my left hand, though I seldom spilled.
I, too, tend to put my belt on “upside down”. These days I don’t wear fancy belt buckles so I forgot about all of that until it was mentioned. My work station always has the phone to the right, since I usually have to take notes, and of course has all my pens and notepads (and other supplies) to the left, which seems to have upset the cleaning people more than my co-workers. Twice a week I would have to re-set up my desk first thing in the morning, so I took to putting all the pens and supplies in drawers at night. (And we did things with the phone cord so it couldn’t be moved far from it’s location.) I do use the mouse on the right side; my daughter, though, has hers on the left, but doesn’t use one with buttons reversed.
I think, being a typist and a keyboard player, I’ve learned to use both hands fairly equally for physical movement types of tasks, but if I’m carrying something, it’s going to be in my right hand and will have to be juggled for me to shake hands with someone. I gather I would have had problems in the military, too, since I carry my purse on my right side as well. Not something I’ve thought about in decades, I admit …. all the little things that tell people you’re a leftie that only a fellow leftie notices. *lol*
Cashpoints, especially Barclays ones. Am I the only person who feels a total pillock having to step to the right of the machine in order to be able to get my card back out? They have a silly recessed bit for you to grasp the card, but on the right side of the card!
I was really relieved to read about the shoulderbag (purse) on the right as well – I’m the same but hadn’t realised.
As a lefty, i cannot play baseball/softball for i throw and catch with my left hand. Also, when i turn my ipod sideways to type, the end with the speaker always has to be on the left. I have been told multiple times by my music instructor (whos a lefty too) that i couldnt keep the beat with my left hand for the rest of the band would get confused. And that it took her a period of time to get it down perfectly. My question is why should we change for them? I want to someday create an all-lefty band/orchestra to prove that we can perform music just as well as the right handed people. Anyways, revolving doors are another problem. They rotate to the right instead of to the left which makes timing an issue for me. Escalators too, i want to stand to the far left side of the escalator, but theres brissles that give major brush burns on your skin if youre too close to them. Oh the life of a lefty.
The search button on my touch screen phone is on the wrong side and also I keep switching the phone off due to where the button is.
I wish the would make an app or a programme to switch it around.
Wow, I never realized that being left-handed may be why my parents were so frustrated trying to teach me to tie my shoes. I was talking, reading, and toilet trained before age 1, but I was almost 5 before I learned to tie them, and it took a left-handed family friend to teach me!
I live in the US and at my University I can get disability status for being left-handed, which would allow me to use a table in the classroom rather than a right-handed desk. I don’t exercise this option, as I can manage.
I learned in Junior High that the only way I could take notes properly was with legal pads, which I only use to this day.
I have to use forms at work which have labels on the left side and spaces on the right, which means I am constantly having to lift my writing hand and go back to find the proper line.
I, as many others have said, naturally prefer to read magazines back to front.
When I was in kindergarten and I learned to write my name for the first time, I was told it was wrong. “But,” I protested, “It says Robert just like you asked me to write.”, to which she replied “Yes, but you wrote it with the wrong hand.” The only answer I could give is the truth: “No I didn’t.” That stopped as soon as I told my mother that afternoon (as she was one of those who had her left-handedness beaten out of her in a religious grade school).
The more I look into it, the more I feel defined by being left-handed. People may not agree with me (or maybe they can’t keep up?), but not everyone can look at the world from a 10% perspective!
It’s crazy how many things like this you don’t even think about. I used to think it was always tough for children to learn how to tie their shoes(it also took me years when I was little before I learned which shoe went on which foot, I always had to ask people around me if it was correct), which way to turn keys, on what side to cross paths with someone, etc. Something I’ve thought about just recently is the hugging-issue. It always gets awkward when I try to hug someone, especially if it’s for the first time, because we both lean to the same side(well, left for me, right for them). Now I avoid hugging my friends, and new acquaintances, because I don’t want them to feel awkward.
I never realized it before, but I have a problem hugging people because we go the same direction. For some reason, because of the awkwardness, people seem to see me as standoffish. It’s just I’m trying to figure out which way to go.
I have noticed some of these same problems myself in my lefthanded world. As for when you cross paths with someone I thought you did it the same as if you were in a car. Those of us in America move to the right so the person id passed on the left. Screw-on lids are bad news. My Dad doesn’t understand why it is such a big deal. It involves more than logic for us for some reason.
All of my qusetoins settledthanks!
I find a problem with crocheting. Often times you don’t end up on the correct side of the work, because you work with the left hand. So you actually work from right to left, where righties work from left to right. I end up having to do an extra row or skipping one to make the item come out right. Some patterns you just can’t do!
I’ve been crocheting for over 50 years, and I’ve never run into that particular problem other than with graphs for a very specific (non-symmetrical) design. Same with knitting, though in both cases something diagonal will slant in the other direction. When the first row is the outside (say a sweater or other garment) then that’s the same if you’re leftie or rightie. Where the main confusion could be, though, is when the directions state to “shape right shoulder”; you’ll be shaping the left. I don’t even notice that any more, it’s 1st shoulder shaping and 2nd shoulder shaping to me. *g* I wish we could get together so that you could show me where you’re having problems. I may have solved all of those before I was ten years old so I don’t even notice them any more.
I’ve learned to adapt to the best of my ability to most right-handed wyas, but the one thing that still seems to get me is the belt thing; I’ve always looped it through my right side first (as is natural), which never seemed wrong to me until I bought a belt fro the clothing store I worked at that had little hearts for the holes. When I put the belt on, the hearts were upside-down, as belts are typically made to accomodate right-handers; I’d come to ignor it, but I’ve had people point out on occasion that the hearts were upside-down. It wasn’t until I had gotten a Coca-Cola belt buckle (I’m a Coke fanatic) that I really noticed it was a problem; when I’d attached the buckle and wore the belt for the first time, it was upside-down. Originally, I left it because I was defiant to thread a belt the right-handed way; if it wasn’t for the numerous, annoying comments about my upside-down buckle, I never would’ve consented.
On another note, I recently started a job where I work in an office all day; after I rearranged the entire thing to suit my left-handedness, I immediately switched the mouse buttons to make it compatible for me and moved it to the left side. I love how frustrated my non-lefty coworkers get when trying to use my computer.
I always flick through magazines and newspapers from back to front.It does seem more natural.When I wind the flex back on to my vacuum cleaner I do it anticlockwise.
A couple of years ago the council replaced the windows with double glazed units – all right handed handles!! The new doors are all righthanded as well.It feels difficult opening the locks.
As the other lefties have commented – the payment card machines are given to us in a right handed manner.
I am amazed at how many really brilliant people were left handed.I have bought a left handed block calander for 2 years now and all the famous and indeed clever people there were and indeed are.It just goes to show that we are not dim yeh?
Us lefties are far from dim . . . . . how many right-handers could cope/adapt to a left-handed world ??
Hi there! I really don’t think right handers would have a chance in a left handers world,lol oh! Does any one experience this? when I’m vacuuming , I cannot control the vacume cord, O man I get it tangled up so bad, also when I go go shopping, get to the checkout, I ask the staff to swipe my card as I mess that up too.there’s no way in the world I can carry a bag over my left shoulder, I have to be to the left of everything, you know what we all need? A leftorium like on the simpsons , lol
Is it just me or is life just a problem for us lefties? because I agree with the comments about picking up drinks and stuff and all the other things that have been mentioned actually, hehe. But I have also noticed that everything is hard for me because I’m still in school so it is very awkward because if teachers decide to put us in seats i always get put on the right of a right-handed person so we always bump into each other and it’s really annoying but I am too embarrassed to say to the teacher because it just seems like I’m making a fuss. And I also have trouble in P.E because if I am doing a bat and ball game (such as hockey or rounders) then due to the way that I hit the ball the teacher always says it’s out of bound so I get put out, but it’s not my fault this world is set up for right-handed people and I don’t think it’s fair.
I notice that being a dominant- truly dominant not cross dominant lefty- I have trouble using can openers, lighters, scissors (the bane of our existence), situating items in my hands, handing money to people, using a cash register -my work requires it, and they claim to have it calibrated for either use but they do not.
- calcuators, notebooks, binders, and with my video game systems- esp. wii which allows you to change depending on the game- others that don’t I just hold each in the opposite hand and it works. A lot of people don’t know how exactly our brains work, but we do, and I feel lucky having parents who were lefty capable, not just lefty tolerant. I had and still have trouble tying my shoes. My mother had to teach me the opposite way, and she did the same when I started knitting and crocheting and doing latch hooking. My father and both of my grandfathers are lefty’s, but I am – out of the three- the only truly dominant lefty. I do nothing with my right hand save for things that require two hand usage. 
Whenever I go to fill up my car at the gas station and pay at the pump with a credit card, the picture showing how to insert the card seems ambiguous to me. I often but the card in the wrong way and have to turn it around.
i face the same problem like “Dot Sale, Ontario, Canada. ” said.. i feel very confused when it comes to the directions .. i often guess them in opposite way..
I work in the hospital and when I am having a patient sign their consent form for procedures, I always hand the pen to their left hand while confronting them with the paperwork and pen. The patient always crosses the right hand over to take the pen out of my left hand when I hand it to their left hand! No matter how much I try to pay notice to it, I always cross the pen over to their left hand to sign. I do the same thing to shake their left hand when they send out their right hand to shake.
On Sundays, I walk out of church with the bulletin and other papers in my right hand, leaving my left hand free…naturally. Then the minister puts out his hand and I have to juggle to shake it. You’d think I’d learn, but I do the same week after week.
As far as tieing shoes, my mother said she practiced tieing while looking in a mirror so she could teach me.
I also tried to learn to knit, but that was pretty much a disaster.
Right handers just don’t seem to get our issues. My DH bought a new door handle for the door to our basement. Oddly enough it only turns one way…the WRONG way if you’re trying to use your left hand.
I have trouble unlocking the door usig my left hand, always turning the key anticlockwise, which feels natural. I also cannot use a corkscrew (thank goodness for screwtop wine bottles); but to get over this we bought a lever action corkscrew on our trip to Australia. Another problem I have is the keypad locks at work, if I try open them with my left hand I cancel the code, I have to use my right hand to do it. You can also tell which documents I have filed as they are all the opposite direction to everyone elses.
Using the mouse on a PC I share with right-handers – I tend to put it on the left side and everyone else puts it on the right side of the computer, meaning everyone has to move it around after I use it.
and the whingeing that comes from the others — I ignore because it’s the only thing they must cope with in their work day!
I fix my families computers and they all complain afterwards that I left the mouse on the wrong side. I’d like to see how they would feel about everything else being the on the wrong side (or way, or just all wrong!) for them haha.
P.S this website is awesome!
It’s been really good reading about all you left handies out there and our ‘quirky’ ways. My husband & I are both left handed and when it comes to going to Weddings and Dinner Parties we always wait till the others pick up their glass/bread first. I never thought about belts until I read there were so many others who put their belts on ‘upside down’. I wondered why I always found it hard to follow dance steps, until I read Martys comment. My ticks are always back to front much to the amusement of the right handed people at work. Keep the comments coming.
I do the same thing with tick marks… my colleagues say they always know when something is mine, because they go the “wrong” way.
Is it possible to help – I would love to find a messenger bag which I can use over my left shoulder, to sit on the right hip. All the ones I see go over the right shoulder and sit on the left hip. I find it difficult to get to the pocket for the phone for example. Normally I carry a bag on my right shoulder but the messenger bags on the right do not work for me.
Help!!!!
Diana