Thank you for this post! It was very helpful tonight as DD3 had a complete melt down. Which is somewhat normal for kids but the intensity catches us off guard.I was starting to think what am I going to do this is not normal and it was nice to read all these posts about the tantrums. It reminded me to take a breath and use the skills we have learned over the years.

So maybe it will be helpful to someone else. I have noticed that they get overstimulated after being in situations where they have to try very hard to fit in, behave, not be so loud, intense, active.

Example waiting rooms public places that are generally very quiet where they can not move around a lot and are not very engaged. For many of you with older kids this would be the case at school! After holding it together for too long they just cant take it anymore. One of the things we have found that works is to do some sensory related things. Tonight we ended up taking everything out of DD3s room, toys, clothes that were out, extra blankets, stuffed animals. So it was just walls and bed and one very soft blanket and pillow and one favorite animal if necessary.

The point is to make the room as UN-stimulating as possible. We dim the lights and turn on soft music. Then we do some sensory stuff like lightly squeezing their arms from the top of the arm to the hand, rubbing their hair back, or patting their back. If they are really having a hard time I would rock them, even the older kids, pretty quickly and then slow down as they relax. For babies I would roll them on my excersize ball. These and some other OT techniques can work pretty well on our kids. By the time we did this DD3 was asleep. If we don't do anything once they are that far gone it can get pretty overwhelming for us parents and it is not pleasant for the children.

A lot of these techniques can also be used way before they get into melt down mode. Our older kids are pretty good at noticing their own signs and will ask to have their arms squished or whatever works for them. Some kids like to jump on a trampoline or swing for a period of time earlier in the day each day to avoid melt downs. Having an older child roll on the ball is fun too.

I have thought about this a lot and I think the behavior is from a build up of intensity. Sometimes from a lack of stimulation and sometimes from too much. I have worked extensively with people with autism and special needs and I see definite parallels in children in the gifted community. In children with autism it can be from the frustration of not being able to communicate with others around them way they need to?

A lot of the things that are helpful in that population can be adapted to working with gifted kids and teaching them to self regulate their own behavior and develop ways to better control their own impulses and be more aware of how their environment affects them so they can make changes in their environment that are helpful and find ways to meet their own needs as they get older.

In our experience these skill have to be very actively taught and the earlier they learn how to do this the calmer they are. I am curious if this output of intensity is more severe the more profoundly gifted a child is, or maybe it is just more personal temperament? Hope this is helpful, good topic!