This may seem like an infinitesimal difference, but asking a child "
why did you do that?" can elicit a shrug whereas asking "
what were you thinking when you did that?" can elicit a very revealing description.
I'm having a difficult time reading/processing your response due to an error in the quotes in your post, which conflates my post and your response. Possibly you can edit/correct the quotes? Meanwhile I'll try sorting it out here...
- thank you!
We are alienated socially because my son is a wild card - not sure who he is going to get along with at the party, etc so a lot of times, we just avoid.
In what ways does he not get along? For example, is he quiet and stand-offish? Is he uninterested in things the other kids want to talk about or do? Have you coached him in social skills? Has he been enrolled in a social skills group?
--He has been in daycare and now kinder and first grade. We are social parents and have exposed him early and often to social situations. He is just more intense than other kids. At a birthday part for karate this weekend for example, everytime the coach would give directions, my son would summarize what the coach said and repeat it back loudly and obnoxiously? No other kid was doing that. He ends up clashing with kids if there isn't something to entertain him with maybe because he is bored? For example, last year we went to an easter party where the kids were going to color easter eggs and hunt for eggs. My son isn't going to nicely dip eggs in a container and wait patiently for them to change colors. He would have mixed all the other colors, spilled half of them, broken the eggs on the ground. Its really obnoxious behavior and most kids (and esp girls) and their parents are offended by his behavior. We ask him why he does stuff like this and he has no response, can't explain himself- whatever it is. He isn't' a bad kid, hes just so intense and most other kids are taken aback by him. To him, I think he just is having fun. He just doesn't operate at the normal kids level, which ends up with us staying on top of him the whole party to make sure he isn't destructive, but then what is the point? We aren't having fun so it we end up leaving.
He is a major sensory seeking kid. He has to smell everything. Like once he put a twig in his ear and we got it out with a tweezer and he grabbed it and put it in his hands and all he could was just smell it with these long deep breaths as if it was his way of understanding what just happened to him.
Did you have a conversation with him about this? For example, did you ask him if his ear was itchy, sore, plugged and not hearing well, etc? Did you show him pictures of the inner working of the human ear? Discuss ear wax? Otoscopes? Safety of not putting things in the ears? Ask him why he smelled the stick removed from his ear?
-- I do ask him all sort of questions and let him know that he could really hurt his ear. We had to bring him to doctor once get a rock taken out, so to him he just likes to experience everything sensorially. He goes to a summer camp where take him to the beach at the end of the summer. The whole team of coaches came up to me afterwards and was like in 30 years of running summer camp I have never ever seen a kid enjoy the beach like your son. He doesn't just play in the sand and water, he rolls around in it and lets it covers his hair and face while he eats the sand and he is so happy. Everything has to be sensorial to him, but he's not like autistic kid; he's very much 'normal' when you meet him. He has two younger sisters and when they were both born, he takes their little bodies and holds them and caresses each body part like a tag while he sucks his thumbs. He just has to experience everything so deeply and it makes him happy. I am not sure if my first comment here made it seem like a negative thing. His sensory issues (or maybe they aren't issues) make him happy and satisfied. I just don't see other kids needing this extreme stimulation.
He also puts anything in his mouth and will eat food out of the trashcan and from the floor despite his peers telling him he is gross.
What type of discussions have you had with him about putting things in his mouth? About
what he is thinking when he does this? About germs?
We talk about putting thing in his mouth and that they are dirty, etc until the cows come home - he just can't help himself. His summer camp had a bug week and they brought in the preserved dead bugs and cockroaches, etc. All the kids were looking at them in aw and one of the camp counselors told the 80 campers that they were edible and asked if anyone wanted to eat one. Obviously most of the kids cringed and said no way, but not my son - he was the first and only to volunteer and without hesitation bit the head off a beetle. Eating beetles, things off the floor, etc have no consequence to some one like him. He finds satisfaction in it bc he needs to experience.
You mention that he speaks nonchalantly about death. Has any person or pet that he was attached to died? Has he experienced the permanent loss which death brings?
No one he has known has died, so its odd he is way to comfortable talking about it and understanding it w ease.
I am thinking of getting him tested for giftedness as I don't have another diagnosis.
People can be gifted or high IQ and also have a disability. This is called twice exceptional or 2e.
I know what 23 is.. .not sure if he would be considered 2e as I don't think he has a disability unless he is ADHD.
Some thoughts:
- Kindergarten and 1st grade are not necessarily social skills training groups. While most children pick up on social skills by casual observation... some might say as if by osmosis... other children need or benefit from direct teaching. Here are a few of the many resources available, a brief roundup on direct teaching of social skills(body language, friendship, etc)
1) book:
100 social rules for kids (hat tip to sanne)2) direct teaching of
non-verbal cues3) direct teaching of
friendship 4) direct teaching of
perspective taking5) link to an article on the Davidson Database,
Tips For Parents: Gifted Children's Friendships6)
post with roundup of articles on friendship
- No, a child being disruptive is not just another way of innocently having fun. Being disruptive/destructive
is offensive and shows a lack of appreciation/respect/courtesy for the rights of others... what you describe may be a deficit in "perspective taking" and/or impulse control.
- A child who has not experienced the death and permanent loss of person or pet s/he was attached to, and therefore has only an intellectual knowledge of death, may seem more nonchalant about death than a child who has experienced a loss (some might say "suffered" a loss).
- You will want to do websearches on "twice exceptional" and "2e", to become informed about these terms.
- I agree with others that more testing would be helpful to understanding the cause(s) underlying the behaviors.
