When my daughter was born, my mother commented to me, “She’s going to be smart.” I smiled and agreed with her– high IQs run prevalently on both sides of my daughter’s family. While I would love my daughter unconditionally regardless of her intelligence, I fully anticipated that she would be gifted.
“I hope she won’t be too smart,” my mother added. Drunk with post-birth hormones and new-mommy love, I bristled at my mother’s statement. How could anyone be too smart? How, in particular, could my beautiful child be too smart?
Maybe I should have paid more attention to my mother’s well-meaning warning. As the mother of several gifted children, she knew first-hand about the special needs associated with a gifted child. Although I am proud of my daughter’s intellectual abilities, I now understand– as I cope with my literate, brilliant, and phenomenally irritable toddler– that gifted children are special needs children. As the parent of such a bright child, I can expect to cope with many of the struggles typically faced by the parents of kids with disabilities.
When most people hear the term “special needs child”, they think of children with profound disabilities, such as mental retardation, severe autism, and paraplegia. I will not insult the parents of significantly disabled children by comparing my challenges to the daily plight of caring for a child with serious mental or physical handicaps. However, I do know that my child’s giftedness places her in a unique special needs circumstance.
The most major setback that plagues gifted children is the expectation that they will excel in every area. Several well-meaning people have commented that my child who speaks in clear sentences and uses advanced words is “smart enough” to be potty-trained. They fail to realize that “smart” is only half the battle. Although exceptionally bright, my toddler currently lacks the physical dexterity or emotional maturity to tackle potty-training. As with many gifted children, many of her intellectual abilities seem to come at the expense of other common skills.
Social problems also plague gifted children. My daughter is finally overcoming her anxiety to the point that she can socialize “normally” with other children, but her interests vary significantly from other children her age. She would much prefer to read a book than watch a movie. She would rather stack blocks neatly than throw them wildly. She wants to discuss endangered species instead of Barbie. I make it a main priority to enable her to develop the early social skills she needs to excel in all areas of life and enjoy a happy childhood.
Gifted children are blessed with special needs regarding their emotional health. During my childhood, I was formally identified as “gifted” after my parents and teachers struggled for years with my episodes of anger, anxiety, depression, and tantrums long after I should have outgrown them. Watching my own daughter, I see echoes of the same behaviors. I realize now that they are the result of a mind that moves unusually quickly– shifting constantly from interest to interest, worry to worry, emotion to emotion. Gifted children are hard to discipline because they struggle with a constant influx of strong emotion.
In academic settings, gifted children pose an additional challenge. Many develop strong interests outside of school but fail to thrive in a standard academic setting. Learning disabilities like Asperger’s syndrome, ADHD and dysgraphia are more common in gifted children than in the general population. Parents and teachers may be judgmental of a gifted child who shows prodigious abilities in art or English but fails miserably in mathematics.
If you are the parent of a gifted child, the universe has handed you a very mixed blessing. The most important thing to do is to accept your child for who she is, placing no specific expectations on her future academic, social or creative achievements.
Furthermore, I advise you to value your child for her kindness and compassion rather than her intellectual abilities. There are millions of gifted people in this world, but there are far too few good people. As a a parent, I view it as my primary goal to raise a child who changes the world with kindness and love– not with intelligence alone.
