Teffany asked Nicole Kiefer:

How did you overcome the bullying and being dyslexic did people make fun of you when they found out about it?

Nicole Kiefer Hi Tiffany,
I don't think I so much overcame the bullying then as I grew older and maybe a little wiser, I accepted it for what I believe bullying is, ignorance and fear of others knowing of that ignorance. Bullies want to feel superior and powerful, and they try to achieve it by making others feel inferior. Once I realized that I stopped fearing them, and pitied them instead. Over time they realized that all they got from me was kindness, acceptance and pity and most stopped. It also helped that I learned self-defense and nobody was willing to mess with me any longer.
Since my Dyslexia was discovered a few years after I was done with school I didn't have any kind of support to help overcome it. I read a lot about Dyslexia and talked to people who had it and after a while I realized that because I loved reading and read a lot my brain had learned to compensate for my dyslexia in that department. Only I had no idea how it or I had done it. There is no cure for Dyslexia and I'm far from "over" it. Still I began to develop my own system. For example, when I write I let someone read it and words I repeatedly write wrong end up on a list beside my laptop. I use narrator software to hear mistakes I can't find while reading, When I can find someone with time I let them read it to me as well, often finding mistakes that way. Where I still struggle a lot is with grammar and punctuation, but I work on it every day to get better.
As to being made fun of after finding out... hmm... not really everyone I talked to was understanding and supportive until I started as an author. After my first book was published I wrote about it online a lot, trying to promote it but encountered a lot of harsh and often mean critique over my spelling mistakes. I'm someone who can easily laugh at herself and her shortcoming, I make fun of myself at times and I think I could have easily dealt with beeing made fun of, but what I encountered bordered at hatred. It was one of the reasons I didn't start again after moving to Canada, I feared to find the same. Luckily I didn't, people here are more open minded I think, at least when it comes to things like dyslexia.

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