Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Twice Exceptional Ever feel like it is E/e?

I did feel like the disability e overshadowed the ability e in terms of time invested in working during the early years of elementary - there's no way around it, when a child has an LD like dyslexia they are going to need to work much harder than kids (gifted or not) who don't share the LD. I've been frustrated for my ds over it, and wish like heck he didn't have an LD, but I've never really felt sad about it - it is what it is. What I did that helped me feel better early on (and also helped my ds once he was a little older than your ds, and after he had a definite diagnosis, was to read stories about successful adults who'd struggled with dyslexia etc - you can find *tons* of those stories online, about people who are very familiar to most of us as extremely successful adults (the founder of Jet Blue, Charles Schwab, Patricia Polacco (sp?) (author), the actor who plays Harry Potter is dysgraphic, etc). Most of these adults had a tough time in school, some didn't have their disabilities recognized until they were adults. The key theme though is that their LDs didn't define them as adults. I've tried my best to take what I can learn from reading their stories to help my ds get through school as best as possible. I've been up front with him from late elementary on that it's simply going to take more work than it takes his non-LD peers. That isn't the way anyone would want it, but that's the way it is. Gradually over time I see some of the brighter side of having to push through an LD to get to the other side, of having to put in all that extra work. DS is at the point where he's making progress, progress that *he* can really see and own, and that's helping tremendously with his ability to see that he can shine in spite of it all. Middle school made a huge difference too, because now the world of classes has opened up and he's got a chance to take accelerated classes with teachers who are teaching subjects they are trained in, not just general education all bunched into one class/one teacher. That's helped put ds in situations where teachers get to know him and start really appreciating his intellect and not seeing just the struggles.

I think another tough part of early elementary is that it's a time when *many* parents (not just parents of 2e or LD kids) compare milestones, and also when many parents are convinced their children are amazingly gifted because their children started sounding out words before they got to kindy. And parents like to talk about how amazing their kids are when they are starting out in school (and in preschool). This part of parenting (the part where you're immersed in all of that) is going to fade into the background relatively quickly once the kids hit 2nd grade and beyond. Early reading doesn't necessarily predict amazing intelligence - there is a wide variety of ages at which kids are developmentally ready to start reading - even EG/PG kids. In your case, I really do suspect that there's something to your ds' struggles based on what you've written, but I think it's important to keep this in mind so that it's not so painful comparing what's up with your ds to other kids in the classroom. Chances are he's not the only one who might still be working on sounding out letters or early site words, and chances are there could be other high IQ kids in amongst the kids who are not great readers yet.

I don't know if this bothered anyone else, but the idea of the whole class sitting together (and with parents in the room) and reviewing where they are at in reading seems potentially embarassing for some of the kids - I know it would have bothered 2 out of 3 of my kids. When my kids were in K/1, reading was done in small groups so that similar-paced kids were together.

Anyway, I apologize - I had to post this in a hurry and I'm not sure it makes sense.... please know it's not always going to feel like E/e - the LD is *not* going to take away from the amazing person and the amazing thoughts and ideas that your ds holds inside, it's just going to make it tough for awhile to fit into the square peg of elementary school.

Hang in there,

polarbear

eta - just wanted to add that I think, for me, the most frustrating thing over the years is seeing how the LD e has impacted my ds' socially. He fits in really well socially at school and has friends now, but he felt very alone and different in early elementary, and it felt to me like the people you'd think would go out of their way to care about having kids like ds feel included (teachers and school staff) instead treated him as if there really was something "different" about him (rooted in personality, not LD). Getting him out of the school he was in helped tremendously with that, but even now, when he has a great school environment and has friends and is popular at school and things are rosy... he is still spending so much time on homework at night that he doesn't have the free time other kids have. He purposely chooses not to join many after-school group activities because his first thought is always "I won't have enough time to get my homework done"... so that's not exactly what I'd hoped and dreamed of for school and outside of school to look like for my kids. And that honestly still gets to me at times.

Re not remembering names - my ds never could remember names of his classmates. He finally remembers them now, in middle school, but otoh he's in a very small school and he's in the same classes with mostly the same kids all day. I think part of it is his LD, and part of it is what he's interested in. Even though he remembers their names now, I still see big differences in the types of things he notices at school vs what his sisters notice - they are much more socially aware, and that part of it (for my ds) I think is simply that what the other kids are doing just doesn't interest him as much, kwim? In any event, there were things in K/1 that I just didn't worry about as important for my kids and let it slide - I think that in this case, memorizing his classmates names might be one of them.