Unwrapping the Gifted

I'm re-posting this on my blog from a site I visit frequently called Unwrapping the Gifted. I read this posting and my heart sank. I've had many conversations with Tom and his mom about what it was like for him growing up. I want to be better prepared for what I'm up against with my daughter(and possibly our son). She's a carbon copy of my husband who is also gifted. School for him was a nightmare and we as a family want to change that for our kids. We want learning to be a joyous experience and a great time of exploration. But my biggest fear raising a Gifted child is that she will suffer from depression. Caitlin is a social butterfly and wants to be friends with everyone. She has a tremendous heart after God and just loves on people. Her compassion far outweighs anything I've ever seen before. But she struggles with making friends and keeping them. After a time they find her "weird". I hate that. It breaks my heart and crushes me to my core. Kids can be so cruel, I just wish that other parents taught their children to tolerate as Tom and I teach our own. We explain differences to our kids so that they can be compassionate to others and learn to live with others differences. Anyway, she has come to me many occasions at the park crying. She was trying so hard to find someone to play with and no one would acknowledge her. No one would include her in their play. She would then ask me, whats wrong with me, why dont they like me, I have no friends here. And this is my fear, that she will feel so left out that she will become depressed and withdrawn.

A few months ago, we started to attend OT once a week with other girls similar to Caitlin (she's the youngest but gets along better with children that are older than she) with similar social issues. Some are more extreme then Caitlin and some are the same. Anyway, before we put her in this group I could see us slipping down a path where my 6.5 year old was becoming depressed. I didn't know it at the time that she was depressed because it was manifesting in other ways behaviorally. I didn't *GET* her, other kids didn't *GET* her or understand why she did the things she did or why normal girly things didn't interest her. Eventually, I know this sounds crazy but, I had to mourn the child I thought I had, and rejoice in the one I was getting to know. I learned to not care that playing barbies wasn't her favorite play time activity but that looking through a microscope was. She's succeeding and I see from the sparkle in her eye that I have my little girl back. I never want to slip back in that place where its her against the world. I thank God everyday for The Lighthouse Project. Its bringing my angel back to a place where she enjoys herself and is getting to know some really great kids she can have some lasting friendships with. We are lukcy, most families dont know something is going on with their children till much later. I've had numerous moms tell me, "at least your finding out now (her peers in her group are 2 years older). But because we are so involved and we homeschool (which helps a TON, we dont have to fight school district red tape), we know our kids very well and what their needs are so that we can get them resources early or give them encouragement in the areas where they struggle. So for now my hope is that we can steer clear of depression and direct her to a life that is full of challenges and wonderful experiences and to help make her life fulfilling. So that she may one day leave her imprint on the world.

Unwrapping the Gifted
written by Tamara Fisher
Good-bye, M.B.
Posted: 10 Sep 2008 08:55 AM CDT

Good-bye, M.B… School has started once again, yet you are not here with us. We’ve re-convened after a summer of travel and relaxation, learning and camps, celebrations, … and mourning your death. The other kids come in with their backpacks over their shoulders and I think of you, the one who didn’t make it back…

Your easy grin, your brilliant curiosity, your penchant for deep questions and conversation, your friends who have carried on so admirably without you… I have found thoughts of each of these wandering in from the back of my mind at odd moments during this first week of school. Back when you were a little 3rd grader, talking as fast as you could think but faster than I could listen, I never imagined this moment.

I look at my little 3rd graders today and can’t bear to imagine it with any of them.

This is the painful part of teaching, when the ‘real world’ yanks our classroom doors open and sweeps in without warning to snatch away the future, when all our positive efforts seem to have been for naught, when learning comes from Life’s hard lessons.

Back in my undergraduate days, I remember my EdPsych professor posing a terrible question in class one day: “What will you do when one of your students dies?” She said if we taught for enough years, it would probably happen at some point. Of course, in our youthful eager idealism, it never seemed possible back then. We were going to be teachers to change the world, to make a difference, not to struggle with these agonizing questions.

But here are her questions again, battling in my mind. How do we support our students when something like this happens? How do we balance giving ourselves time and space to mourn yet still be strong and supportive for our students? What is a teacher’s role in the aftermath of tragedy?

Nowadays, particularly after 9-11, schools have plans in place for dealing with the variety of tragic (or even just challenging) situations that can befall us. And those plans do help – a lot.

But the pain is still there, and teachers are human, too.

And perhaps that’s part of what we can give our students at a time like this – letting them see a glimpse of our humanity, a peek into our “real-person-ness.” Maybe it’s like those moments when we see a student at the grocery store and he is blown away by the fact that we have lives outside of the school building. “You buy groceries, too?” Of course! And we also cry, too…

Life goes on, and learning goes on, and we must go on, too.

***** ***** *****

I actually wrote the above portion of today’s post a year ago – and have struggled ever since with whether or not to post it, whether or not to broach the broader not-yet-mentioned topic, and how to deftly, accurately, and sensitively talk about it…

September is Suicide Prevention month, and today, September 10th, is Suicide Prevention Day.

Some people tend to assume that suicide occurs less frequently among this group of bright kids who seem to have everything going for them. Other people tend to assume that it occurs more often among the gifted because the existential nature of a gifted person (including existential depression) can lend itself to some dark thinking.

But what does the research say about suicide and the gifted? It’s a mixed bag – and at this point in time the bag isn’t very full yet, so that’s a complicated and difficult question to answer (1, 2). There is some research (1, 2, 3) with – among other things – a conclusion that gifted students may be at more risk for suicide (the third link cites other studies that appear to have reached that conclusion). Yet one study (1) deduces there just isn’t enough accurate data available on this topic yet to draw precise conclusions. Some studies show that it occurs at about the same rate (not a significantly more or less frequent rate) as it does in average, same-aged peers (1, 2, 3). Finally, chapter 7 of "The Social and Emotional Lives of Gifted Kids" by Tracy Cross does a great job of covering the overall topic and its inconclusive research base.

Perhaps the most oft-cited authority on suicide and the gifted, though, is a research summary in "The Social and Emotional Development of Gifted Children: What Do We Know?" by Maureen Neihart, Sally M. Reis, Nancy M. Robinson, Sidney M. Moon. These two quotations come from that text:

"Although it is a popular notion that gifted children are at risk for higher rates of depression and suicide than their average, no empirical data supports this belief, except for students who are creatively gifted in the visual arts and writing (see Neihart & Olenchak, this volume). Nor, however, is there good evidence that rates of depression and suicide are significantly lower among populations of gifted children."

“It is not at all clear whether suicide is more or less common in gifted adolescents than other adolescents – the statistics simply are not available – although it is easy to develop rationales why the rates should be higher or lower.”

But even if the statistics don’t indicate it being any more or less of a problem for the gifted, it’s still a tragedy in each individual case - and in all cases of all ages and types of people. I wish that I remembered my students M.B. and R.V. for bigger reasons than how they died.

In part because of M.B.’s death last summer, a service-oriented student organization at our high school conducted a week-long series of suicide awareness events this past spring. One of my students, a friend of M.B.’s, was among the handful of kids who put in countless hours over many weeks to organize and run the awareness week. His dedication to the task as well as his assistance for his fellow students was impressively thorough. But having so much on his plate during that time, something had to give, and that something was his until-that-point 4.0 GPA. At first disappointed in himself for “failing” to maintain his perfect grades, he soon reached the most important conclusion: “Yeah, I got a B in Math… But I saved two lives.” I couldn’t have been more proud :o)

So… today’s post is in part my way of finally having the guts to put those above thoughts out there – and also about linking you up with what the somewhat-limited research says about suicide among the gifted. Most importantly, though, I want to leave you with some valuable resources to access should you want or need to learn the signs of someone considering suicide, should you be concerned that someone in your life is contemplating suicide, or should you – heaven forbid – need some tips for how to handle the aftermath.

Suicide Among Gifted Adolescents: How to Prevent It

An Overview: Understanding and Assessing Suicide in the Gifted

National Suicide Hotline 1-800-SUICIDE

National Suicide Prevention Lifeline 1-800-273-TALK
or NSPL at MySpace

Suicide Prevention Resource Center

National Association for Mental Illness

Supporting the Emotional Needs of the Gifted

American Foundation for Suicide Prevention

Feel free to add your own resource ideas as well :o)