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

I will try this one ... In fact we bought some books on the education of difficult children. They are mainly read by DW. But every "recipes" we tried had been working (tense??) for some days and collapsed ... We tried pictograms, time timer, barkley solution with tokens and rewards. I do not know if the collapsing of these tries is because we are not good enought at that or because DS simply does not want to play the game any longer.


Well I am not fuming anymore. Let's say I am just resigned ... I just simply tell him to take his fork being neutral. Anyway, I will try as you proposed ...


Can you be more precise about what you think, please ? For me, this behavior is one great enigma. I have an explanation of my own. But I rather ear yours before (if any), just not to influence.

The reason why I do not give full credit on this result is more in relation with the psychologist than to a possible faking of my son. Well from preceding posts, you may understand that psychologists (at least the French ones) are not my friends. Anyway, I can not see why she would have "cheat". Moreover, after her explanation of the results she told us that even if DS may have some psy-problems, she thought that with such discrepancies in the scores, we should better see other specialists to deal with compensating his problems. The fact is that she was impressed by our son during his sessions with her. As an example, she reported us that during one session, DS took a kind of maze-game in her office and succeeded sponteanously on the first try without any explanations on what to do. This game was a support to test kids up to 16-years old. She said that it took her 2 or 3 tries to succeed knowing what to do. It is very hard to believe when you are facing a child with such great difficulties at school and at home. She also told us that during the tests DS was walking around in her office taking small objects, looking around, not truly focusing while answering her questions. This is so hard to believe ... I have no doubt that my DS is intelligent but he is as intelligent as the others and I do not see any differences in the real life (from the intelligence point of view). It was only with this woman that he accomplished such great things.

Well, he is just amazing at that .. Actually, much better than reading in books . Of course, it is more a feeling than anything very tangible. One problem is that I think that he can literally play with that capabality. I think that is why the first two speech therapists did not succeed with him... he did.


You are wellcome ... I do not print your answers, but actually I shared them with her.

A global answer on the medecine concern just to let you understand the situation in my countryside (it is the same for many people in France, except maybe those from Paris).
So in my countryside, there are only 2 neuro-pediatricians which are truly specialized in children behavior problems (may be 2 or 3 more are aware of). To meet those specialists, you have to take a rendez-vous at least 7 or 8 months before. We see ours once a year. In case of problem, we just can call him and it is very hard to speak with him for more than 3 minutes. So when we change medecine, when DS faces sleeping problems due to ritalin, when new problems appears at school, this doctor just applies "recipes". It is just worrysome for me but we have no choice.
Just an example how can things happen with our neuropediatrician. The first time he saw our DS he told us that if we do not use ritalin, DS will just face a disaster at school ... Well it is clear that after such assertions, it is no use to explain to the parents the usefulness of that drug.
I am not truly blaming the doctors for that, I think that they do the best as they can for the maximum of people.

Well I will try a new thread for that issue because DS is on holydays right now without ritalin and I have to speak about that experience ...


I agree 100% with that.

Homeschooling is out of question at the present time. At least for 2 reasons : i) money and ii) I am not quite sure that DW will survive very long making school to DS. She is so anxious with that, so involved that it will end by a nervous breakdown ... It is not because I am doubting on the mother's capacilities. No the speech therapist (who is specialized in giftedness) did not say anything like that ... Anyway, what can she do in a school system where pupils have to all learn the same things, the same way. Those who are not on this pathline are just retarded, not gifted ... Untill now, the teachers of my son understood him and leave him alone with too much demands. They did and do not stigmatize him, and I am happy with that ... It is not the case of DW, but she wants so many things from them.



Well, we will study that point but the French system is not as flexible as that. Nevertheless, skipping can be easy or not depending a lot on your location, on the director of the school, on the numbers of pupils in each grade, on the director of the local county education administration ... Often you have to prove the giftedness, but that might not be enough ..

That's it ... Well, she wishes he can read so hard...

I get back to work now ... Answers to others later on. Sorry

I just wanted to throw out there that a lot of kids with ADHD combined with other issues (Aspergers, mood disorder, anxiety, etc) often have problems with stimulant medications like Adderall or Ritalin. We have found success with a non-stimulant called Tenex (or Inntuiv.)

One about kids with ADHD, rewards systems often do not work for them. They need immediate consequences or rewards. They may logically understand later that what they did was wrong, but in the moment, they are UNABLE to stop themselves. It's just the way ADHD works. It makes teaching them how to behave incredibly hard. Schools are often unable to provide the immediate reward/consequence they require. What we are doing with my son is a chart the teacher keeps on her desk. Anytime she sees him doing something good (finishing a worksheet quietly, lining up without incident, etc) he gets to check/color a box. It's such a tiny thing, but he gets to SEE, right away, that his being good is being recorded. Plus, he knows that if he does well all week, he'll get some sort of reward on Saturday (racing R/C cars with his dad, or a special Lego project.)

Good luck. I don't know if it's possible for you to obtain a non-stimulant ADHD medication where you are, but I would push for it.

Well, unfortunatly, our neuropediatrician only seems to precribe ritalin or so ... And I do not have heard of any other medicines in France except in special cases with very special hospital protocol ... But I will check that point.

the chart in school seems a pretty good system ... I will try to talk about that with his teacher. Thank You

I don't have any clear picture but in my family it's quite normal for young boys to eat with their hands. No one likes it, but it's mostly ignored. We all start out 'rather floppy' in terms of coordination and strength, and catch up in our 20s.
No sports stars in our high school years.

None of those kids started with a fork and went to hands, though. It's sort of 'assumed' that these boys just aren't coordinated or patient enough to use a fork until they 'grow into themselves.' Eventually the children grow up and start to care about how their peers percieve them and start using a fork - at the older age they are more motivated and more coordinated as well so it isn't as much work.

At our house we use the expression, 'is this the hill you want to die on?' when judging which of the child's behavior needs to be corrected. Things like kindness to others, being on time, and love of learning seemed so all consuming that I dodged the question of manners. If I had been using the 'Transforming the difficult child workbook' back then I would have known how to give a correction without all the effort and heartache (maybe) and things might have been different. We will never know.

I myself hold the fork in the right hand and the knife in the left hand, which I understand is normal in Europe, but I've gotten plenty of negative comments about this in the U.S. Here my understanding is that folks pick up the knife with their right hand to cut, and then rest it on the plate, and then pick up the fork with the right hand and so forth back and forth. This seems way to complicated to me, but the fact that I didn't 'naturally' notice what others do and immitate them shows some mild motor planning issues/attention issues. Frankly, while I'm eating I want to relax and not worry about a dirty knife sliding off the plate and one the table cloth.

All of this fall under the general catagory of what my son calls: 'What is easy for me is hard for others, and what is hard for me is easy for other kids.' I'm glad that he is getting the idea early that giftedness doesn't equal perfection in all areas. It took me rather longer to get that message.

We also have a French family who are family friends, and my husband warned us that table manners are a much more deeply held value for them than for us. This may not be true for your family, but if it is, and your son used to be able to use the fork with some automaticity, the fact that he isn't now may point to the idea that his overall 'capasity' to do difficult things is low right now. I'd also want a medical doctor to make sure there isn't a disease interfering with his strength or coordination.

Peace and Smiles,
Grinity

Point of information: nope, definitely not! The only Europeans I've ever seen eat like that were convention-defying left-handers, and in fact almost all the left-handers I know still eat with the knife in the right hand, as the right-handers do. However...
Yes, that American way of eating looks weird here! Here's what British people do:
1) Usually, and always in formal settings: hold the knife in the right hand and the fork in the left. Use both to cut and use the fork to lift food to the mouth. Importantly, the fork always stays in the left hand and always has its tines curving downwards: irrationally, you're simply not allowed to turn it over to make it a more effective shovel.
2) Informally, with food not requiring cutting: use a fork only, hold it in the right hand, and use it with tines curving upwards.
If you're going to use method (2), you have to use it for the entire course; you can't start with (1) and then switch to (2).

Yup, and beware also the things that are compulsory good manners in France which would be bad manners in Britain - e.g. the need to have hands below the table, when not in use, in Britain, but on the table in France, and the different positions to leave knife and fork in at the end of the meal. Argh!

whatever are the eating traditions in France, DS rules out any good manners, at least at home. And even if I can seem quite strict about that from my post, I am quite open. But eating with my son at home is such a mess ...Hopefully, I do not believe in the disease hypothesis since he does well many things requiring fine motor skills (lego playing for instance) and actually eats quite correctly anywhere except at our home... Here is my explanation. DS (then aged 5.5) explained quite a few things to his shrink (the one who tested him). Especially, he told her that when he wanted to do something wrong, he just had to do it, wait that I and his mother argued one against the other on his behavior and then he was able to do whatever he wanted because he was not anymore the matter of concern (I do not know if this is clear)... DW and I always were in disagreement about hand-eating. SO he found a good way to play with us. Now, she also has some problem with messy meals ... But, fortunatly (or not) we more or less gave up this fight.

I hope I didn't give the impression that you are strict, as I don't read that in, I was more wondering about how the extended family or neighbors were judging you and your partner based on your son's behavior. I think it's a shame when parents get isolated from their community because they happen to have a child who can't or won't live up to the prevailing expectations. This happens in the US over many things, I've been on the recieving end of several lectures over the years about my 'defective' parenting that are based on other people's judgement of my son's behavior. Thankfully that seemes to be over. I've had to 'ignore' the judgemental behavior and how it makes me feel so that I didn't become socially isolated at the time, and nowadays I get mostly compliments - not exactly revenge

la vengeance se mange très-bien froide

but I do try and enjoy the compliments now because I know how far we've come.

My son also seemed to use a lot of his vast intelligence making a social experiment any adults he could find who were willing to play. I'm not sure if this was his ADHD or his unusual high giftedness or a odd combination of both. I don't resent this, as I always hoped that parenting would help me grow into a more self-actualized person. As they say, 'Be careful what you wish for.'

The weird thing about my son is that even though he could 'see right through' my praising his good behavior, he has such a deep yearning for honest, undisputable, sincere praise that he - eventually - gave up using manipulation to get that thrill of being noticed. What is fasinating to me about these children is how much they are 'many aged' at once - thinking at one age, behaving at another age, feeling at a different age.

Smiles,
Grinity

Grinity, I am sorry, but I defenitely did not want to make you think I was offended. It is clear that I have an old-school side regarding manners , but not as much as it can be stereotyped for France (may be it is not good English, sorry). But strangely, the older I am getting, the more open I am. ANyway, I am not a man who can easily feel offended, be quiet about that.

It is clear that we are more and more isolated due to my son. Personnaly, I always lived without taking any care about what the others think about me (my friends and family not being in the others). Nevertheless, DW is very sensitive to the others judgement and all the more as this judgement concerns her DS. I just tell her not to care about, but it is fruitless ... She prefers that we stay apart than meeting the others (anyway, she and I are not very good with social stuffs)


FOr the moment, my son do not show that thrill. Alas ! Maybe it will come one day. What you're describing as being fascinating is just confusing for me ...May be it is because is so young...

Thanks Grinity