Are you ambidextrous?

Old Salt

Senior Member
I think I am, but in a strange way! Before I use anything new, I will have to try both of my hands first, to see which one fits the bill! I couldn't throw a ball with my left if my life depended on it, but a hammer doesn't feel right unless it is in my left! Any other "ambidextrous" folks in this forum?
 

Im considered right handed but I have spent my life using tools and equipment so am very comfortable and coordinated with either hand, that includes things like brushing my teeth or shaving. One exception would be writing, but I've never practiced using my left hand, so don't think I can call myself ambidextrous.

In truth do to some injuries to my right shoulder I use my left hand more than my right these days.

My son is predominantly right handed but played baseball as a lefty and threw a football left handed.
 
I'm not ambidextrous but do use both hands. I eat and write with my left hand, do everything else with my right hand. It's called cross-dominance.
Thank you for that new term, @Georgiagranny. I always knew I wasn't truly ambidextrous since, to me, that means being able to use both hands equally! I think I must have been a lefty in my childhood because I remember how my teacher in first grade kept rapping my knuckles for writing with my left. Here's a nice trick: to this day I can write with my left, but it is from right to left and backward! :D
 
My Dad was. When he was in boarding school, they tied his left arm behind him and made him write with his right hand. He used to bowl a cricket ball with his right arm and hit it left. Always used a hammer with his left arm. Played Tennis with his left arm. They used to call "left handed" people 'cakey handed' in days gone by.
my baby sister is the only one in our family who is left handed, and she had the same thing happen to her when she was at school, but my mother got that sorted out, and she was allowed to continue using her left hand.

Funnily enough..I have a theory that every person who is left handed has some kind of talent. I've kinda noticed over the years working in the entertainment industry that the people who are very talented, tend to be more often left handed...altho' oddly not musicians.

Again in my family of a lot of people, no-one has any real talent for anything.. but my left handed sister who is a Brilliant cartoonist , and poet...
 
Funnily enough..I have a theory that every person who is left handed has some kind of talent. I've kinda noticed over the years working in the entertainment industry that the people who are very talented, tend to be more often left handed...altho' oddly not musicians.

Again in my family of a lot of people, no-one has any real talent for anything.. but my left handed sister who is a Brilliant cartoonist , and poet...
Oh, goody. I can hardly wait to discover my talent...
 
In baseball I bat either left or right, no problem. Throwing is primarily left, because in school "lefty" gloves weren't available, so I would have to use a right-handers glove to catch, then sling the glove off my hand, so I could throw.

As for handwriting- strictly left. For tool use, I swing a hammer with my left, hold the chisel with the right...etc.
 
Oh yes! Was left handed as a child and wrote backwards,
and forwards.
but the first grade teacher used to hit my left hand with a
ruler constantly and would only let me write with my right hand.
She hit me until it bled, all the time.
As an adult, I use both hands.
 
Oh yes! Was left handed as a child and wrote backwards,
and forwards.
but the first grade teacher used to hit my left hand with a
ruler constantly and would only let me write with my right hand.
She hit me until it bled, all the time.
As an adult, I use both hands.
That is terrible!! I do understand about the backhanded writing. Our teacher used to make us turn our papers towards the right, which meant many left-handed students wrote backhanded. I always wrote the traditional way, which meant I wrote with a "backhanded hook". Still do.
 
Oh yes! Was left handed as a child and wrote backwards,
and forwards.
but the first grade teacher used to hit my left hand with a
ruler constantly and would only let me write with my right hand.
She hit me until it bled, all the time.
As an adult, I use both hands.
I'm so sorry Gaer. My brother had a teacher try to force him and another left handed student to write with their right hand. My mother went to the school. This is probably the only instance I can remember where she did the right thing throwing a fit. The teacher stopped.
 
I'm so sorry Gaer. My brother had a teacher try to force him and another left handed student to write with their right hand. My mother went to the school. This is probably the only instance I can remember where she did the right thing throwing a fit. The teacher stopped.
Yes, My Mother went to the school for a "meeting" with the teacher.
The teacher stopped hitting me but punished me in other ways.
 
I am in a strange way. I can write forward with my right hand while writing backward with my left hand....mirror image, and the cursive pretty much matches. I do it pretty fast, too.
Et tu @jujube? I thought I was the only one. Do you hold your finished product up to the mirror to see how well you did?
 


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