Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Twice Exceptional Social issues in 6.5 year old son

Dear All,

I am new to the forum. I have been reading posts for a while though. I need some advice.
My 6.5 year old son has never been tested but I have always suspected him to be moderately gifted. The only scores I have are the MAP scores which place him around 98% (both math and reading). He doesn't have any issues in school. I have talked to his teachers since Pre-K and they all have only good things to say about him.
I am concerned about his social skills. Any time we are at a party he gets overexcited to the point that the other kids avoid him. He falls all over them all the time and stays there too long until they yell at him to get off them. I have had many conversations about personal space with him.
He's also physically different. His upper body is very heavy and his legs are very weak. He has a hard time sitting up. And if someone is sitting next to him he tends to put all his weight on them.
He still wets the bed every night. Every night before he goes to sleep he cries saying he's scared of dying.
I am trying to get him tested. We live in Boston and the Boston's children does not do gifted testing. I am confused as to how to go about getting him the help he needs.
Any insights as to what might be wrong with him? Should I try to find a gifted center to do a complete evaluation?

Thanks

I would agree with Portia. I would also say that, if you brought all these concerns to BCH's learning disorders unit, they would most likely include the cognitive assessment (what I assume you mean by gifted testing) in a comprehensive neuropsychological evaluation. If you can get a referral from your pediatrician, that would probably be the best place to start. Such an evaluation would also likely include the PT or OT eval referenced. The main thing is to 1) get the referral from your child's PCP (otherwise it will be both very expensive and a very long wait), and 2) explain -all- of your concerns at intake, so that they assess in all of the areas of suspected need.

You could also have some aspects of this assessed by the local public school district, at no additional cost to you beyond your property taxes, but where it sounds like there are medical issues as well, you might be better off starting from a hospital eval, so they can include those factors in the evaluation.

http://www.childrenshospital.org/centers-and-services/learning-disabilities-program

I've read many evals from BCH, and generally have been favorably impressed.

If you do get an OT eval, and some areas are found that can be worked on, it may also be helpful to see if the therapist can recommend sports or other recreational activities that can also help address the areas that need help. This can help a child continue to make progress (and feel good about themselves too) in parallel with traditional therapy sessions.

The relative weak areas may not be what you think (this is why an eval can be very helpful).

Thanks Portia and aeh. I should probably elaborate on a few of the issues.

Physical - Although my husband and I both notice the tonal issues, the school does not seem to think he has any problems. They in fact say that he's middle of the class in gym.
sleep issues - The bedwetting is not the only issue here. He acts like he's sleep walking whenever we try to wake him up during the night.
Anxiety - He has always been an anxious and a very self conscious child. He's very sensitive to criticism.
Social - He does not know how to play with the other kids. He has a strange sense of humor and laughs too long and too hard at things that are not funny. He is not aware of what he's doing and when the other children respond negatively to him he places the blame on them not realizing that he started the whole thing.
His issues are not easily noticeable. It only happens in certain settings (socially with older kids and overstimulated).
Could all these just be asynchronous development in a gifted child? Or is there something else going on?
Thank you once again for the reply. I am going to proceed with the advice to do the assessment at BCH, the above questions are just for my peace of mind.

Thank you cmguy and Portia.

I will try the evaluation at BCH and see what comes up.

I think an OT eval can be helpful even if a kid seems "average" to a casual observer. A child may be really strong in some areas and compensating for a weakness in another area.

When we did an OT eval a fixable weak area was discovered, and it was not what me or my spouse thought it would be.

cmguy, that is exactly what I meant. He is compensating. We can see it but not many others can.

I will also ask for a OT or PT referral.

Thanks

Schools don't always notice issues. I started asking about DS's handwriting in SK. I was told it was 'normal' for boys to struggle with it at that age (the teachers did work with him on pencil grip). I also asked in grade 1 - was told he was normal. Finally we did a private OT evaluation and discovered he has DCD (developmental coordination disorder). So he basically struggles with both fine and gross motor skills - school didn't notice any of it. (We are still on a waiting list for a school OT evaluation!)

I also asked his teachers about his problems with reading - he could decode and understand everything fine, but when reading longer text he would skip words, lose his place on the page, and then give up. His teachers told me that was normal, but something felt wrong to me. Had him tested for convergence issues, and now we are doing vision therapy. He now picks up books on his own and reads - not as much as DD, but more than before.

My DS also struggles with understanding personal space - it may be partly vision issues and partly that he doesn't seem to know where parts of his body are sometimes.

If you feel something is off, you are right to have him assessed.

Ditto to *everything* aeh said


I really have no idea what's behind what your school said, but want to put one possibility out there (which happened with us): our childrens' elementary school did not want to have to evaluate or provide services unless absolutely pushed to do so. When we were advocating for a school eval for our 2e ds who is extremely dysgraphic and was fairly obviously far behind peers and below grade level in ability to use handwriting, the school staff very typically and repeatedly responded to our concerns by stating that ds was "in the middle, not the best and not the worst" compared to his classmates. In our situation, the school used that "middle" statement to dissuade parents from making an eval request. If a child is truly functioning at an average or "middle" level, the school is not required to do an evaluation, you may be told your child is in the middle simply to put you off from making an official request for an eval. If you have a concern and your school is telling you your child is "in the middle", ask for some type of quantitative evidence of that "middle" level of performance.



It sounds like he might be an extremely heavy sleeper - one of my dd's is a deep sleeper who is very difficult to wake up fully in the middle of the night. She also needed to sleep in pull-ups at night until she was around 7 years old because she didn't wake up when she needed to go at night. She wakes up now (she's a teen) but she still goes wakes up and needs to go in the middle of the night almost every night.



My 2e ds' first obvious (to us) symptom that something was up was anxiety - he became extremely anxious in early elementary school, to the point that it was the anxiety that prompted us to ask our ped what to do, ped referred us to neuropsych, neuropsych discovered DCD and dysgraphia. While anxiety can exist in and of itself, it is also often a secondary symptom to some other challenge, particularly in young children who don't have the maturity to understand what's really going on or who don't yet have the communication skills to communicate what they are struggling with.


It sounds like there's something else going on. Getting a thorough evaluation will help you understand what's up - and if nothing is found, that's good info too! As aeh noted, the testing you're curious about re giftedness (cognitive ability testing) is routinely included in this type of evaluation, so you'll get that piece of the puzzle addressed, but more importantly (jmo) also get invaluable information re what's going on with your child.

Best wishes,

polarbear

It sounds like are are sensory issues going on, which can include postural issues and issues with bed wetting, and the advice PPs have given about getting a full neuro psych eval with particular emphasis on OT eval for suspected sensory processing disorder is spot on. Gifted testing will come on the side, as it were. The postural problems need not necessarily impact him in gym, depending of what they are doing.
Note that sensory issues, including the overexcitability in social situations you describe, are a very common "package" together with giftedness, but if it is impacting him in the classroom and in other social situations, they should be addressed.