Thank you for your feedback. This is exactly what I think is going on with my son but I've yet to find any studies or reports to back it up in a meeting.
The diagnostician from the school told me recently that she knows how badly some parents want their kids to be gifted, but some of them just aren't - but that doesn't mean they're not bright or valuable or blah, blah, blah.
Having been a mother of one bright but not gifted child and another child who tested gifted in all three exceptionalities, I can say without equivocation that I would never wish being gifted on a child for the sake of my ego. It is rife with its own set of challenges and hurdles, and I often think gifted kids have a bit rougher road because of assumptions made about them and because they do not fit easily within the standard education model.
My reason for pushing so hard with my youngest is because I recognize that while the numbers may not indicate a gifted IQ, he displays many of the characteristics of the gifted personality. And as such, he is not going to thrive inside of a square peg in the public school system. But because of his LD, he is not going to thrive in a private school, either. And so I keep pushing the system to give him services that they don't think he needs and keep pushing a diagnostician who thinks I am one of those moms who needs to have gifted kids to feel good about herself.
IQ scores can very much be skewed by a learning disability. My son's GAI went up by 35 points (FSIQ went up by 23 points, but was not reportable) in five years due to intensive efforts at remediation. I believe his most recent GAI is still being depressed by 10 points or so, but that's a whole lot better than being depressed by 45 points!
