Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Parenting and Advocacy deterioration; we're at a loss to find solutions

I also meant to address your comments below about perfectionism. I am sure you right that it will reoccur again. However, with help in the time before that happens you may find an entirely different reaction next time. Therapy and learning new coping strategies can make a HUGE difference. They certainly have here.

Let's talk financing, I would. One of these gifted specialist therapists, how would they be paid? Could you get a referal from your local psychiatrist for one that specialized then have it covered by insurance, like ear, nose, and throat guys? If not, if the out-of-town specialist (gifted therapist) had to be paid out of pocket could they be hired as consultants to kind of guide the local (insurance eligible) therapists and then there's less billing hours. Does Dys help find gifted-related headshrinkers? Do headshrinkers offer free initial consultations like attorneys offer on tv, so she could call, tell them the situation. Then they could tell her how they could help and what it would cost for their service, and stuff like that.

Plus what ptp said two posts back.

Honestly--I think at this point, even if paying the counselor a boatload out of pocket has to go on the credit card, it is worth it. It is probably likely to be quite expensive for the level of expertise you need to at least point you in the right direction, but I think the investment would be priceless.

Thanks again to everyone for such terrific support and feedback.

It was truly like an epiphany yesterday to read Siegle and McCoach.

VERY much an "AHA!!!" kind of moment for me.

A nice summary of different types of motivation in the context of Goal Theory

Siegle and McCoach, 2005

Always before, we'd been looking at a single dimension of behavior, trying on various labels and feeling that it wasn't quite right... I mean, sure, we've seen some signs of executive function deficits... SOME signs of affective disorder, etc... but there were these untidy tendrils of other stuff that refused to fit in that box.

I am reminded of the parable about the blind group studying an elephant by feeling its parts, and then describing it to one another...

Reading about performance avoidance in the context of perfectionism made EVERYTHING crystal clear. I'm completely serious-- EVERYTHING about her fits it. Everything.

So I spent some time last night just chatting with DD (low pressure once I got DH to quit interjecting his 0.02c every ten seconds) and asked her a few questions (in the direction of Siegle's ideas on the subject)...

Her answers were illuminating and confirmed everything about my suspicions. It broke my heart, too, to see the true depth of her pain.

Me:
What feels like "success" to you? How do you define that for yourself?

DD: 97% or above is okay. 100% is what I call "successful." Less than an A+ isn't successful, because I should have done better. (* note here that she has NEVER heard such a thing from us. EVER.)


So 100% is how you know that you have been successful, then. How does it feel to earn 100% on things?

Initially, she cavilled here and noted that "she wouldn't know, being such a failure..." after which I pointed out that she recently earned 100% (the R+J essay, in fact). She then said: "Yes, but that wasn't really my work. I mean, it was me writing, but it wasn't all my ideas." (*This is ludicrous, frankly. She said stuff here about not feeling like she 'can do it on her own' which is CRAZY, since she apparently feels that if she talks to classmates, teachers or US about a subject/assignment, then she's "just using other peoples' ideas." )

So you earn 100% sometimes, but you don't seem very happy to have met your goal. Can you tell me about that?

Her answer here indicated that she feels "relieved, but mostly just tired, and sometimes like a fake," in the wake of success. Her words.

How do you feel when you don't meet your goal? I mean, how does it feel when you earn a grade less than an 'acceptable' one?

Worthless. Ashamed.


She has tried to reach out to the Special Ed teacher for help with study skills (which she knows she lacks, since she didn't need to learn them in 4th-5th grade-- and so she didn't), but the teacher seems to not know what to make of this kind to plea in a student who has no LDs and is so obviously capable. In other words, DD feels that her attempts at self-advocacy have been fruitless.

She is uncomfortable with the challenge of the math course. She doesn't know that she can earn an A+, and it bothers her because it makes her feel stupid to have to take a risk like that. It also makes her cranky to need help-- she's based a lot of her self-image on being "super-kid" (and she's had plenty of reinforcement there, very little of it from us), and it threatens her very identity if she can't succeed spectaculary just by crooking her pinky, as it were.
_____________________

My heart was just breaking for her. It is so crystal clear to me that this has been caused by her innate personality and a school placement which allows for no real academic challenge-- other than PERFECTION itself. In the absense of any other possible "goal" that became DD's only goal. Now that is slipping away from her, and it's spilling over into everything else. All of what we are seeing-- the insomnia, the disordered eating, the sloppiness with self-care-- all of that fits.


So yes, counselor/psychologist. NO, NO, NO to local middle school enrollment. At least DH understood that this morning, as I pointed out to him that my personal take on this was that they would leverage inappropriate academics to weed out the disability.

He seems to understand how ludicrous the suggestion to have DD sit through three more YEARS of math (that she already earned straight A's in the first time through) actually is in this context.

So-- much better on the home front. Hey, we're all Emotionally OE people, and all HG. It is what it is.

We aren't yet sure what to do about math. On the one hand, letting her back away from an (appropriate) challenge may act as a reinforcer for "you're right-- you ARE incompetent," at this point, any grade she earns in the course isn't going to make the situation any better. Then again, even the A+'s she's earning aren't making her feel any better, either.

My gut says that the only "right" thing here is to keep tabs on her, keep SUPPORTING her through the course with extra help and interaction, and send her the message that she is capable.

Oddly, I feel better about the situation having figured out the underlying problem. I mean, yes we need professional help. Definitely.

Now, though, we know that we need to be moving her away from activities which are about "judging" and "scores/grades" into mastery activities that are non-competitive in nature.

We also finally have some insight into why no method of intrinsic or extrinsic motivation has ever seemed to work for her for any length of time. She's impervious to punishment or rewards.

I have to say thank you in particular to Grinity for pointing me (gently) at perfectionism early on, here. It wasn't until I started listening and looking at the evidence (and there's a mountain of it) that I thought to look harder at the ways that perfectionism can manifest.

Hi MammaKarma!
Great to hear that you have a game plan. I love those links you put up there - excellent work which will be very useful to many of us here!

Glad to hear that your DH is backing off the Middle school button.

The good news is that now you have a working theory to go on.

I was struck by this:


Love and More Love,
Grinity

lol!

I can tell you that figuring this out now and addressing this issue now is such a gift to your dd. This forum and other research I have done over the past year to help my dds has really made me reflect on my own past choices, and perfectionism/fear of failure played a significant role--choosing classes in high school, college, career choices, etc. And sadly, for me, and now I see it in my dd, the perfectionism is in the areas where we have perhaps the most natural talent and passion and somehow then an even higher expectation of A+ performance therefore greater fear of failure and so it goes. I will be very interested to follow your progress in guiding your dd through this!

I do feel like this is the situation where CBT (with someone who gets giftedness) could be very helpful. Maybe someone has personal experience that could shed some light.

I think so, as well, deacongirl.

I have some familiarity with CBT-- used some of those techniques to deal with my own self-handicapping as an undergraduate. Once I realized what the problem was, that is.

I also know abuse survivors who have had a great deal of success using CBT to alter their thought processes and responses to stimuli.

Credit cards are there for a reason, therapy being a darn good one. I was voting in favor spending extra on an out of network therapist. If insurance doesn't cover what your kid needs you have to pay cash. Whatever's best for the kid, of course. I was just asking about cost because it still matters. According to(cite tv) financial stress breaks up family's, SN's strain households, etc. fishing for some BTDT guides to make it easier on HK. Feel free to pm HK, lol.
(about insurance and gifted specialists)