Giftedness with Kandace

I recently started reading about giftedness in children. I came upon it somewhat by accident, more out of a curiosity prompted by many people commenting on Ashar’s unusual alertness since he was a baby, his incredible comprehension even before he was verbal, and always seems to be thinking. A few of these people suggested he might be gifted. So one day I googled it and became almost immediately captivated by what I was reading, mostly about the special needs of gifted children. 

It’s been almost 3 years of me feeling like very few typical resources have helped our family with our “issues", whether they were sleep challenges or emotional needs or boredom/stimulation needs or me feeling more inadequate than I could handle. When I happened upon the giftedness literature, I finally felt like the solutions offered for those special needs made sense for our situation and, actually, many were what I had already started to identify as being helpful for us. I felt like I found a home and people who could relate to what I had long felt — but unable to articulate — were unique challenges with our child. I finally found hope. But as quickly as I found hope, I felt more alienated from many people around me because I felt unable to share this new direction without the worry of me or my child being judged. I was even hesitant to tell Mike at first. I haven’t felt confident speaking about this to anyone short of my mom and Mike. And then… I took a leap of faith. A friend of mine who has children older than I, made a comment on a facebook post that lead me to believe that she might have a gifted child of her own. So I very hesitantly reached out and asked, point blank, if she had a gifted child. Turns out she does… and this is a conversation that followed. 

Resources:

Is my child gifted? Use the check list at the National Association for Gifted Children: https://www.nagc.org/resources-publications/resources-parents/my-child-gifted

Giftedness Resource: http://www.davidsongifted.org/

Supporting Emotional Needs of Gifted Children: http://sengifted.org/

Multiple Intelligences: http://www.mandyland.ca/blog/2018/2/26/rethinking-intelligence-its-not-all-or-none

Me! Please reach out if you feel that anything here struck a cord with you and you want to talk. I hate feeling alone in this and would love some mutual support!