God Doesn't Want Me To Study Languages

So I've just figured out why I struggle with the Japanese 'r' sound so much and why I cannot roll my r's. It also links to how I cannot lick the icecream bowl without managing to get icecream on my forehead and why I cannot, for the life of me, bend or roll my tongue in any way whatsoever. I appear to have 'Ankyloglossia'.

I've always had a short tongue. That's cool. At least I have a reason for it now. Ankyloglossia (often known as 'tongue tie', apparently) is where the skin under the tongue is unusually thick and/or short. So my tongue is attached to the bottom of my mouth. Well, everyone's is, but mine is stuck more than most. I don't know how this affects others, but for me it means I can't pronounce my R's properly. I didn't realise this until tonight, actually, when discussing pronunciations with my Dad. That was when he pointed out that I was weird. :3
I can't say an 'R' with my tongue. It comes out as an L sound. I try to compensate for this by using my throat to say anything with an 'r' instead.
So, for you normal-English speakers... say something, like 'rate'. Your tongue will probably be near the top of your mouth when you say the 'r' sound, right? Mine drops to the bottom of my mouth so that I can use my throat muscles to pronounce it. I have no way of explaining what I do, actually... Just that my tongue has very little to do with my 'r' sounds.

This also explains quite a lot. I did get tongue-tied more than anyone else as a kid...

Hm, yes, well, anyway. I pronounce my r's the same way that most German's do, it seems. Which is great, except... I'm not learning German.
And oh, the irony, it's also similar (though not quite to the same extent) to French 'r' sounds. I do not want to speak French...

I'm studying Japanese. In Japanese you pronounce the 'R' sound in between where you pronounce the English 'R' and 'L' sounds. But... that makes no sense to me because I can't make the English 'R' sound. So I kind of... make up a sound under my tongue. I'll explain that further down.

I also want to study Italian and possibly Spanish, which typically use the alveolar trill... or, you know, rolling the r's. Something I can't possibly do with my throat (Well, actually, I could learn, but at best it'll sound like a slight growl from what I can tell, and I don't really want to be growling at people). And I can't just learn to roll my r's the normal way, because my tongue won't work like that. It's kind of anchored to the bottom of my mouth, moreso than most... I've tried, but no matter how I position my tongue, it'll sound more like an 'l' than anything else.

The title of this post is wrong. It's not that I've been cursed to never study languages in general. It's more like... God has built me to learn languages I don't particularly like. Yeah. Thanks for that.

Not all is lost. I can make a slight rolling sound, in the same way I manage to make the Japanese 'r' sounds. I manage by moving my tongue in position to pronounce 'd' and then flicking between my 'r' and 'l' sounds underneath my tongue. I don't know how to explain that... I pronounce the 'r' with my throat, but flick air under my tongue to create an 'l' sound. It kind of rolls. It still sounds like more of an 'l' though. Actually, it mostly sounds Japanese and not at all Italian. That's not surprising though, since I figured this out while trying to pronounce the Japanese 'r' sound.

So much effort to make sounds that most people can do easily. O_O

I can get the annoying membrane under my tongue cut in surgery once I'm older, and I probably will do that. It's supposed to hurt a hell of a lot afterwards, but I think I can deal with it.

Curses. Of all the rotten luck...