Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Twice Exceptional how can I rise my 2e son self-esteem ?

Once again thank you all for the help each of you brings to me !


In my first post, I omitted to say that my son is followed by a dyslexia/dyscalculia therapist (3 times a week) and a psychologist. After 3 changes in dyslexia therapist in a year, I guess we finally found the good one. He is now making progress in reading. It is hard to compare the different methods you talked about since I am not a dyslexia professional and I therefore do not know if they have equivalent in French … I will try to investigate that point.

Concerning the homework, we cut them in small pieces (about 10 minutes each … corresponding to something like 2 to 5 minutes of real work), let him have some 5-minute break in between … We encourage him even for the smallest success. But, the biggest problem is to bring him to work. He just wants to play, nothing else … He yells, breaks things, bites us, punches us (yesterday he punches his mother in the face) … We are against being violent especially with our children, but sometimes, believe me it is very hard to face that. He is perfectly aware that he is wrong doing such things and the final result is that his self-esteem goes deeper and that we are more disappointed … Sometimes (we do not know why), he will start working without any trouble, but it is so rare.

That makes me think about what grinity wrote : "your first job is to make it plain that you love and enjoy and respect him in his current state". Well, it is definitely the case. He is aware of our love and respect. We try to prove that to him each day … But, when you are punched in the face, bitten, yelled at while he does not even try to dress himself in the morning, while he still eats with his hands at home (and so on…) it is very hard to find the strength not to make him face his own dark side …. Anyway, I will try to read the stories on this board that I discovered just a few days ago.

Polarbear : well, it looks like you underwent the same things as me… Gifted program is not a thing that you can find in France except in locations very far from our home and work (the closer one is 600 km far I guess) and they are quite elitist even if they recognize that high IQ can come with learning disorder. One school is not that far from home but they seem to be booked for next year … The only thing we are waiting for is a special assistant that will help my son in class (for that we had to cry for fundings from a French institution for disabled persons …); something that has nothing to do with his giftedness but with his various dys … We've been starting (tense ???) slowly to get him used with keyboarding.

ADHD or not ? Hard to say. Ritalin does work but the neurologist had to double the dose reaching high levels for his weight. I am not happy with that but … His mother find the ritalin effect is not that clear. Even with Ritalin, he is always a kind of "thinking tornado" but he can do other things than being in his tremendous imagination …. Anyway, when I see him work (let's rather say trying to work), I and his mother rather think in an error in the IQ tests !

Beckee : I would like to believe this story on the "Goldilocks Zone" … But at the present time, we are rather in the "nowhere zone". It is very hard to get the spark of interest you are talking about … unless you speak of dragons, ninjagos, wolves, werewolves, owls … and he is so bewildering. Most of his discussions is non sense jumping from one point to another. Maybe, we are just incapable to enter his thoughts and I am sad with that. Polarbear's sentence "He gets interested in what he is interested in, not what someone else finds for him to be interested in" is just right in our case.

We tried several activities : judo (where he behave very quietly compared to others while not being under Ritalin at this time), music, circus, theater … No activity seems to attract him, except paintings maybe, very strange paintings indeed (very fond of yellow … kind of yellow monochromes)


Technological solutions : We are just about buying Dragon Naturally Speaking so that he can "write" things by himself. Seems like there are no French equivalent to learning ally, but we read a lot of books to him and he enjoys that (he could listen for hours till his parents exhaustion… I remember reading him the first harry potter book and a Jules Vernes's book last year … but we mostly read book for his age). A voice recorder sounds like a good idea. He likes taking photos, movies and we let him do his things with that … We should encourage him more and praise more his photos and movies (even if it's often quite strange too …. looks like David Lynch's stuff)

I think that I have to think about "Believing in himself is essential to his being interested in learning. For my boy, I told him that we would do whatever was needed to help him learn what he was interested in and then helped him figure out what that was. At the time, it was oceans and sea animals. We got lots of materials and worked through it together and his face lit up to know he really COULD learn. " from master_of_none. That's somehow comes with the Special Time concept described by Grinity. It is definitely something we (the mother and I) have to deal with. We try to spend time with him, but our investment is not as high as you describe it. Nevertheless, this requires time and time is a thing we are always struggling with … He is always late with the simpliest things (getting dressed, eating, …) We use a Time Timer to help him with time going on, but he seems just not to care about that …

ABQMom : point 1 : Do you mean that we should present him the idea of his "exceptionality" ? Well, I am not convinced by that … First, I do not like people who think they are superior (well, indeed, that's my problem and not my son's one). Secondly, he is aware of his intelligence and says things like "my intelligence serves me nothing". On the other hand, he daily faces his differences ( and more and more strongly at the present time"). So, explaining him that the reasons of these differences are exactly the basis of his strengths might be helpful … I am just unsure about that.

Point 2 : we exactly do as you tell because we are convinced that he has to learn to struggle, even if at the present time after struggling the results are not very exciting (that renders his will to struggle lower and lower …)

Point 3 : I already dealt that point

Point 4 : Well we still do not have found the thing that he will truly enjoy. Very hard to find one, indeed. I am very fond of music, play the guitar (I am not very good). I wish he likes music, but up-to-date, I do not find a way to make him enter this marvelous place. I still hope he will but I do not want to force him (I was ..). I also like sports, I wish I can play soccer or tennis with him but he just does not care about sport. His uncle is a climbing teacher (a very good climber), but my son does not care also.

Point 5 : I am just here to learn more on 2e than I can find in France. I am happy to be able to dialog with people who face or faced the same challenge. Home schooling, an option ? Well, yes since both I and the mother work, but who knows …I guess it will be hard moneywise.

Point 6 : I already dealt that point


Well, I quit right now … too tired.
Thank you for reading me and for your answers

Firstly, you are doing a great job.

Secondly, in regards to some of the ADHD comments - kids with ADHD often have no concept of the passage of time. They need constant reminders of how long they have to finish their task. Have you talked to the doctor about a non-stimulant ADHD medication? There are several now, and many have success with them. My son is currently taking Tenex (the short-acting version of Inntuiv) and it has made a huge difference in his behavior.

Good luck!

Wow. Life sounds hard for your family and your son. A few questions for you:

1) can you outline a pattern for the current behavior, when did problems start appearing, what the evolution was and how/when you got the diagnosis (ADHD/dyslexia)? Who did you see, when (how old was he), and did you get all the labels at the same time? Do you have detailed scores for the WISC-IV (all domains and subscores)?

2) what's going on at school? What grade is he in? CE1/2nd grade? What month was he born in (is he young for that grade?)? Is he showing the same behavior issues there? How are the teachers handling his differences -- both the giftedness and the learning disabilities? If you are about to get an AVS (note to other participants: special assistant = 1:1 aide within a mainstream classroom) I am guessing the situation is not good there, but... more details?

3) How does he do with other kids? Does he have siblings? Friends? At school? Outside of school?

4) You said you went through 3 dyslexia specialists. What didn't work with the previous ones, what works with this one?

I don't know if it has been recommended yet but if you can read it without spending months laboring over the translations try ordering this book: http://www.amazon.com/Misdiagnosis-Diagnoses-Gifted-Children-Adults/dp/0910707677. It goes through basically all the DSM-IV labels (including ADHD and ASD, because the behaviors you describe don't scream ADHD to me, but then I am not a specialist) and tries to distinguish gifted symptoms from other symptoms.

Re. reading, how did he react to the higher level texts you reqd to him? Did you try books on tape? Books that are appropriate for his probably low reading level might be excruciatingly boring to him.

And I would definitely talk with him about his exceptionalities -- if only to say that you understand how frustrating it can be to have so many ideas and such a hard time getting them out.

Lastly... Your written English is good enough, but I have no idea how hard it is for you to type this all out (and/or read other people's posts). I'd rather keep this discussion going in English, because you will get more useful feedback from other people with better knowledge of your issues this way, mais je peux parfaitement continuer la conversation en français ou clarifier des traductions si nécessaire.

And yes, that, too.

Technology solutions: record yourself reading those books. Then you won't get exhausted as quickly.

Have you had him evaluated for Asperger's Syndrome (AS)? Some of the things you mention make me think very much of it.

The limited range of topics that he is willing to engage with is one strong sign that makes me think about Asperger's. This is one of the hallmarks of the diagnosis. (You can use these interests to help gain cooperation with schoolwork by incorporating them into assignments, especially if you homeschool, BTW.)

The fact that what he says will often not make sense to you is another one of these signs: we spent years with my son who is diagnosed AS asking him "What are you talking about? Please give us some context. What does that have to do with what we are discussing or doing?" He was initially very resistant to this, because he really didn't seem to understand that we had a different perspective and didn't automatically know everything that he knew, or what he had been thinking, or what he had seen, or what associations he was making. He would just start talking in the middle of a thought stream that had been going through his head, and expect us to know what he meant and what he was referring to - sometimes in words of his own devising. It was infuriating and frustrating for all of us - from his perspective, we were just being obnoxious and controlling by making him conform to some arbitrary speech pattern we wanted where he had to give background information first, instead of just listening to what he had to say. He has gotten much better about this, but it has taken a long, long time, and it will still happen sometimes, but he will usually self-correct now if we just say "What?"

Kids with AS often have real problems with transitions, and have to be warned ten minutes in advance, then five minutes, then two minutes, then one minute, in order to avoid a complete emotional breakdown when they have to "switch gears" and stop any activity, but particularly one that they are enjoying, especially if they are having to stop something they enjoy to do something difficult that they hate. Some of the out-of-control behavior that you are seeing when you try to get him to stop playing to do schoolwork may be a manifestation of something like this. (A good technique for handling this is to not only give frequent reminders about the coming transition, but to try to arrange activities so that the fun stuff comes after the not-so-fun-but-required stuff, so that there is a reward for getting through the unpleasant things, and the thing that comes after the transition is something to look forward to.)

The still eating with his hands could be related to fine motor challenges, or it could be a sensory behavior either related to not liking the feel or taste of utensils or to seeking the sensation of touching the food. Both of these (motor challenges and sensory avoidant and/or sensory seeking behaviors) are common in kids with AS.

I'm not trying to diagnose your son over the internet, but I wanted to make sure that this was considered

One more thing to consider: Ritalin can make some kids more impulsive and irritable, and it can cause confusion and uncontrolled speech, so you may want to discuss this possibility with the physician who prescribed it, since your child is on a high dose, is getting violent with you while on the medicine, and you noted that his speech can be incoherent.

I hope we can help you find the answers that your family needs.

I would agree with aculady, although these days I see AS everywhere .

I hope that's not the case, because 1) finding somebody to diagnose is going to be tough and 2) treatment options are... not good in France. Refrigerator mothers and institutionalization are mainstream diagnosis/treatment for ASD out there

Hi everybody,

I am currently trying to find the time to answer back your very interesting answers ... But I am right now on the edge of a nervous breakdown or so ... The mother cries, says she hates her son, herself and I. She is so anxious, wants to change my son from school (that's not easy in France except in the private system but the close private schools are completly booked) ... she finds quite expensive solutions ... All that makes me anxious too ... I am so tired right now ...
She said to me that I am losing my time on this forum ...
Well I am truly sorry not to answer as fast as I wish, but I am just struggling to breath... Hope you understand.

We understand completely.

Raoul, I'm so sorry. The good news is that children learn and grow-- it will not always be like this.

We have found it useful to hire a college student to work with our son after school-- the student takes direction from our son's psychologist and occupational therapist, is very likeable and helps our son achieve his goals. Crucially, this also gives us a break. I wonder if you can do something like this? Because yes, it can be maddening.

DeeDee