I am the mum of a gifted child. AMA

[mumof2andimtired]

My son is 8 years old and is considered gifted. I usually just browse on mumsnet but I decided to make a post cause so many people in real life have so many questions!

I also have a 12 year old daughter

I do wonder if you would speak to the OP's face, the way you're speaking to her here. OP has repeated so many times that his wellbeing is the priority, but you and many others just come off a petty and jealous with a chip on your shoulders for some reason. Face the facts, some children are extremely clever, whether you like it or not. We wouldn't have the advances in science and medicine etc... if it weren't for many people like the OP's son.

I think that part of the problem is that state schools have such a limited curriculum that a bright child will focus on one or two things and get better at those just because that is all that is on offer.

I had one very bright child who would have been bored rigid in a primary school classroom, and probably ended up being labelled naughty. As it was at his amazing country prep school he was instantly moved up a year, they used that extra year at the top end to prepare for scholarship exams for senior school. He had different specialist teachers for each subject, learned French and Latin, spent every afternoon outside playing sport and had a choice of clubs every day after school. He was never bored and there was always something new to do. Teaching a bright child more of the same thing isn't the answer, they need to be presented with a huge range of things to learn and physical activities to take part in.

You can't coach someone into being gifted. You just are.

What are his scores on his EP assessment?

Without any formal testing a child can't be labelled "gifted".

As much as I agree the posters words were unacceptable. I don’t think it’d jealousy, autism is very difficult and as much as many thrive, I do not think it’d jealousy is something people envy,

the op says he’s home schooled as the school couldn’t meet his educational needs, she implies this is due to his iq, or if it was in fact due to his autism, but it is more comforting to the op to position it as due to being gifted,

The OP also said she and her husband are actively looking for a school for him to attend and that home schooling is temporary. Only OP will know if his meltdowns are becayse of boredom, autism or a mix of the two, but again has answered many times that they are actively supporting this.

The tone of some who have commented definitely come across in a very jealous way, as though they can't bare that fact that their own child is not gifted. That is a reflection of the poster, not the OP who sounds as though she is trying very hard for her child.

I just don’t see that, so I guess it’s based on how we interpret words. But I see no envy at all, genuinely. I just don’t think envy of autism is a thing.

Not envy of autism, of having a "gifted" child. Lots of spiteful comments on here, telling the OP her child will even out with the others in his age range etc... they can't accept it for whatever reason.

Imo you are hyper-focusing on his cognitive score and labelling him gifted on that basis, when actually he has deficits in other areas due to his autism.

There is a concept called the Gardner Theory of Intelligence, whic identifies 8 different areas of intelligence. Your son will score highly in some but not in others.

https://www.simplypsychology.org/multiple-intelligences.html

I think the OP is only just beginning to find out what autism is and how that might relate to her son. Her focus up to now, understandably, has been on his academic ability and, as pp have said, his school's apparent failure to stimulate that.

That most, if not all,his difficulties are due to autism may take some time to sink in. He won't grow out of it but he can be helped to manage some of the trickier aspects.

"Imo OP should ignore his "gifts" and focus on how to build up his emotional intelligence"
That's not always possible. Depends on the personality as well as the presentation. May happen,may not.

She says they're considering private school and this may be a big help,as long as he isn't bumped out of his age group,where he already struggles. And,of course,that they're sympathetic and able to meet his needs better. It was certainly a game changer for us (despite the semi impoverishment).

But definitely drop the term 'gifted' as it's not helpful at all.

Our son is gifted. We just thought he had a very good memory and also enjoyed maths. In his primary school, the gifted and talented description was frowned upon by the SMT so we didn't know much about it. When he went to senior school we were informed that he was in the gifted and talented group (no idea what the official name was, it's a while ago) but he seemed a bit embarrassed and refused to do any of the extra curricular stuff he was invited to. We didn't even try to get him to engage with it because we weren't convinced it was a positive thing to be labelled. His talents lay in maths and modern languages. He was more interested in music and sport! His career now is unrelated to maths and languages but he is very successful in his job.

A highly academic private school might be the place for him - one that also prizes social and emotional development. Eg Alleyn’s in London gets some of the best results in the country but focuses on social development. A number of autistic students and, in very crude terms (as I know the private school CAT test scores don’t correlate exactly with IQ tests), minimum IQ for entry is 125: so there’s no getting bored in class as ALL the children are intelligent at a minimum, alongside a number of gifted students.

other London day schools offer large academic scholarships for top performance in entrance exams (not Alleyn’s though, academic scholarships are much more modest like 10%)

I don't understand why so many people in real life have so many questions! Many many parents on MN have autistic very bright children, just look on the HE board and see all the kids predicted 3 A stars so I'm not sure what questions will be asked because what you've described isn't that unusual on here.

I miss the days when AMAs were by posters who worked at a crem or in a clothing detergent department and you could actually learn useful stuff. Now it seems to be random people who think other people will find their life fascinating or rage bait.

there is very few questions on here past clarifying the situation simply because it is quite common. And so posters have experience.

i do think it’s much more self soothing to position your child as gifted to others and use that as a way to explain why he’s not in mainstream education, rather than say ifs because he’s autistic. I see the attraction in that, and think it’s understandable

nearly all gifted nt children go through mainstream education , most schools are on the watch out for them as it boosts their results , they want these kids. So I think for the op this is a much more multi faceted situation than she originally presented. Or wished to present.

So so many people wanting to dismiss giftedness. This is one of the challenges of being gifted, it’s treated as something ugly and threatening. You are already feeling isolated, because you don’t seem to think like others and then people - especially parents and teachers treat, you like you have to be torn down a peg or two. My whole life my subliminal message to others is “please don’t mind me…. No, I don’t think I’m better than you…. Please, just let me be around without attack, and see that I’m actually quite kind and benign”.

I’ve never been tested and was never labelled. But it’s taken decades to come to terms with being gifted, what that means, and accept it in me. I still battle guilt every day. The common wisdom now seems to be against labelling. I think I would have loved a little help from one friendly adult who was not threatened, did not see it as a bad thing, and could explain to me and help me fit in better. (I include my parents, who in different ways tried to slap down my understanding of myself- my mum because she felt bad for my brother… my dad, because he wanted to be smarter than this ‘upstart girl’.

it took as an adult quite a bit of therapy and self study on giftedness to get to any kind of self comfort and relatively shameless acceptance that I was different in this way. People tend to assume we are all walking round terribly proud of ourselves, boasting of our abilities. I, and many others spend far more time hiding, deferring to others to fit in, and camouflaging our achievements, so people don’t get angry. I think this is probably specially true of women, who are generally socialised not to boast/be proud of themselves/ advertise their strengths….

Giftedness certainly isn’t a pure gift to those who have it. I think if you are highly, globally gifted, it can create a polarisation - either the isolation/pressure/intensity you live with breaks you in some way, or you can use it like fuel to achieve unusual things (or both at once). If you are averagely gifted, or just in one area, or with additional support needs, then it can all cancel out, or you can choose to turn away from those areas, or build on them, and it can appear to ‘disappear’ as you grow as a result.

I’m sorry you feel thar way,I had my iq tested at 8. So I knew from a very early age , although I didn’t sit the supervised exam and join Mensa till my early 20s , and even then I only did it to prove a point. As I was treated like an air head at work . Because if you’re pretty you must be thick right. That’s why they employed you. So I rammed it down their necks. I left thay company soon after and was never treated like that again.

as I got older I became more senior, I was treated wirh a lot more respect, and I work in a male dominated industry, but then I hid it , as I felt many felt threatened by it and intimidated. I’m very confident and this was not something I had to add to make myself more intimidating. So on this I agree.

all a high iq means in reality is the speed of problem solving. The Mensa exam most people could do, it’s simply how long would it take them . The higher your iq, the faster you can solve the problems. Something which is hugely beneficial in the workplace and has given me a lot of career success

my daughter is faster than me. She’s a lawyer and when she was first applying for her trainee roles, she had to do these online tests as part of rhe initial application process . The tests give you a paragraph then you need to answer a question,which the answer to is implied in the paragraph but not spoken to. So it’s how fast you take in info and process it. She was to do some practice ones and we decided to do it together.just for fun. I was fast. In the top 5 percent or so.

she was faster. I didn’t beat her. She’s no desire to join Mensa. She’s no need. She’s nothing to prove.i however did have something to prove back in the 90s, but fortunately the world has moved on.

i never saw shame in it, just as i aged, i had less of a point to prove.but I do see some people see it as threatening. Many people don’t wish to think the person they are talking to is much smarter than them, and their reaction can be very ugly.

but again, I would add to this, the ops son is autistic. Not solely a high iq. And that’s a very different thing entirely. I understand the op presented it initially as he was solely gifted, but it’s not the case and this boy has more challenges he faces.

I would never have taken him out of school so he could get better at what he already found easy. I kept him there to enhance the things he found hard - social interaction, negotiation, emotional regulation, team working.

This is very perceptive.

Also I do not think people are dismissing "giftedness" - I think some people are just trying to place it in context, as it tends to refer exclusively to academic gifts, when there is a whole array of gifts that lead to a happy life. Concentrating on just the one can be counterproductive.

It really depends how you define giftedness. In the 2000s the top 10% of every school was classified as gifted. So not rare at all. Then at the other end of the spectrum you have those kids who complete their maths degrees at Cambridge by the time they’re 18.

The OP has said he’s not in school due to meltdowns, which sounds like much more of an SEN issue than a gifted issue. Yes her son may be ahead in some areas but is in need of support in many others, and it’s a bit concerning that OP is framing this as a giftedness issue when that’s not really the whole picture.

It isnot your expectations that are the issue- it will be his expectations of himself.

Thankfully our DC is less obviously bright as they reached their teens and school has a wider circle of students. But they is so self-critical. Disappointed in themselves so frequently. Heartbreaking and impactful on mental health.

What do you hope for his future? I was assessed as gifted aged 3 by the university of Manchester iq156 I’ve done ok ( finance city of London), but my daughter who was never assessed as gifted but was super smart and observant has done much better ( Cambridge uni phd ), it opens doors but maybe not what we presuppose.

At what point do you plan to get over yourself?

What an unpleasant comment.

Yeah… and this is the point. Any slight indication that someone might think they or their child is unusually intelligent (even when that is blatantly the fact), then people want to slap them down. Imagine what that’s like as a child… having caregivers and adults being innately angry a lot of the time just because of reality.

The cliche is all the parents and teachers are super excited and likely to inflate the child and their level of giftedness…. That’s not true. Many of them are pissed off, like this poster, that this little upstart is disrupting the plans/ the norm or making them feel a bit dumb. And that’s before you get onto parents of other children who feel competitiveness on top, and the peer group you don’t feel comfortable around.

Some have said that the problem is the focus on academic giftedness …. But people don’t tend to respond the same with eg artistic giftedness. There has been a long running thread about an incredible young girl with amazing drawings on here….mind-boggling talent/giftedness….. and everybody has been incredibly encouraging and acknowledging. There is something very specific about cleverness that goes very deep for people.

Thanks @Velvetandleather. I agree about what you say about the OP, and would have concerns about her son, as he is dealing with two challenges that are piling on top of each other right now. Looks like the OP may have left the thread anyway.

I also agree that giftedness can bring you huge advantages and it has for me also. I think that’s the shame for me - though I’m glad you haven’t suffered from that. Maybe guilt is a better word. It started with my brother. My brother’s actually absolutely fine, and has done very well for himself. But my mum was constantly telling me how unfair it was on him that things came to be easier… and that we shouldn’t tell people when I’d done impressive things, because it would make them feel bad (not just not boast- literally not say at all if I eg won a scholarship or published a book). When my husband cheated on me and left me after 16 years of marriage, she said “oh you have had so many unfair blessings, it’s good something bad has happened to cancel them out a bit”. She genuinely sounded relieved like a bad karma thing had been hanging over her for decades and had finally been put right. 🤣 Bless her.