Most of you have probably heard my complaints about the local schools, and how they are not challenging my son at all. We've made some minor adjustments that have helped a lot, but DS still says he's bored at school. I wonder if that is related to the fact that he's acting like a brat at home? His teacher says he's very well behaved, but the minute he gets off the bus in the afternoons he turns into a totally different kid. I have raised him to respect people in general (not just adults) but it seems he respects everyone except me! He tells me he hates me constantly, but still wants me to do "window math" with him (we do math problems on the back door in dry erase marker). He throws gigantic temper tantrums over tiny things (last night we got home later than expected and he threw a fit because he didn't get the chance to play with his transformers - even though he played with them for a good hour earlier in the day). He sulks and pouts every time I ask him to do something, but five minutes later he'll show up with his chess set asking if I can play with him. After his massive tantrum this morning (over brushing his teeth, of all things) he started crying and saying that he was afraid no one in the family would like him anymore because he is so mean. But he offered no apology or anything. Now that I'm writing all of this down, he almost seems like he's lonely. But his teacher says he has plenty of friends and seems happy at school. I know that extreme emotions are not all that unusual for gifted children, but this seems a bit beyond normal to me. I'm at a total loss for how to deal with this. I'm tired of crying every day after he gets on the bus, and most importantly I'm tired of seeing my little boy so unhappy. Any idea what the problem may be, or what I may be able to do to fix it? I would really like to work on solving this problem before this summer, when his daddy goes to Afghanistan and we have all NEW emotional issues to deal with!
