I agree that I don't really know if his acting out has to do with giftedness or just his personality. He does seem to have a short fuse mostly caused by frustration.
Love, Christy
that 'short fuse' is where the 'Transforming the difficult child/Energy Parenting' book and website can be helpful, not matter what the cause.
Some kids are just born with a 'short fuse' and some actually have a normal fuse, with 'more appliances plugged in to it that usual - so that the amperage is easily exceeded even just doing kinds of things that seem normal from the outside' due to giftedness. Although not all gifted kids are more sensitive than normal, many are, and it is felt to be due to the gifteness itself: what you cal 'strange tendencies' are quite run of the mill here - do a search here for 'fears' and 'death' and 'OverExcitabilities' and you will see that you have lots of company. Another search term is 'Asnychronous Development.'
The idea here is that, like your husband, as your son gets older, he will develop more fuses, locate his large appliances on separate ones, and be able to handle more electricity moving through him than a normally developing(ND) adult and so handle all those extra appliances without much fuss.
I'm glad to hear that your husband is successful now. Get ready for lots of conversations about 'does he feel successful' now. 'How did he get there' and 'what was school like.' Also a great idea for you to journal quite a bit about what you observed as a child and young person about kids who were 'extra smart' and the messages you got about your own intelligence. Even if you are not as gifted as your DH, you may well have been in the top 10% or 5% of your school - which is still gifted by some definitions. Or you maybe strongly gifted in ways that aren't measured on the current test, or even valued by society.
Many females are born with 'a more developed set of circut breakers' than males - it's totally possible that you are just as gifted as your husband, but because you were born with stonger circut breakers, no one noticed. For me, I'm a terrible speller - so it was easy to feel quite stupid, even though I'm gifted enough to be quite bored and frustrated with an 'optimally gifted' crowd.
I'd love to hear how Saturday's session goes. I'd love to see you read 5 Levels of Gifted: School Issues and Educational Options by Deborah Ruf and Ph.D. and let us know if your son fits there.
Love and More Love,
Grinity
