The Gifted Teenager!
Gifted
children see the world differently because of their complex thought processes,
as well as their emotional intensity. Gifted people are “too” everything: too
sensitive, too intense, too driven, too honest, too idealistic, too moral, too
perfectionist, too much for other people!
Friends and family often ask them,
-
“Why do you make
everything so complicated?”
-
“Why do you take
everything so seriously?”
-
“Why is everything
so important to you?”
Even if they try to fit in their entire lives, they may still
feel like misfits.
More often
than not, gifted children can feel alone and misunderstood. They have more
grown-up tastes in music, clothing, books, and food. These differences can
cause other children to shun and even verbally or physically abuse them. There
are resources to help overcome this, as given in my previous blog.
The ennui
and depression of gifted teenagers – why talk about a dark subject in relation
to giftedness? The number one demographic of suicide is 17-year-old males with
high Intelligence Quotients (IQ). Being forewarned is being fore-armed, and
parents of gifted teens need awareness, hope, and help to deal with this
subject.
Some gifted
people actually think themselves out of existence. They ponder the purpose of
life more deeply than most and can reach a sort of hopelessness about it. Teen
years are a very self-absorbed time, yet even bright teens can lack the ability
to predict cause and effect or consequences properly. Science has shown that
the chemistry of the human brain, especially in the frontal lobe, changes after
about age 18. Therefore, even smart teens can err in their ideas of the future.
Teens feel
their emotions very intensely, and being gifted can magnify this. They don’t
realize that a lost love or university choice is not the end of the world. They
can’t project the future properly.
One of the
best medicines against this deep angst is to help our teens serve others. I tell my son to use his brain to do good in this world and make it a
better place. The mental, emotional, physical, social, and spiritual health of
children is important, and learning to volunteer in a greater cause is
important in developing a well-rounded person.
For example,
in Missouri, a great place to get teens involved in service is the annual
Festival of Sharing at the MO State Fair Grounds in Sedalia on every the 3rd
Saturday every October. http://www.umocm.com/festival.htm. Many groups get together and pack food, hygiene kits,
and school kits to be distributed to several MO agencies that aid people in a
crisis.
The ennui
and depression of gifted teens is an important subject so that parents and
educators can be aware of this problem and help teens see other possibilities
and solutions to their problems. Sometimes gifted teens are depressed because
they can’t find other teens like them. They are so smart that no one gets their
jokes or humor. They think on a deeper level than the materialism focused on by
other teens. Often they get along with adults better than their peers who don’t
understand them. They can be depressed because they’re lonely.
My 3rd son
understood the world from a more adult point of view, so all the adults in his
environ loved him. But his social skills with kids his own age weren’t as good.
He was never able to talk on as shallow a level as was required to hang with
the other boys and be cool. Luckily, he hung on until time helped him grow up.
In high school and later as an adult, he found more people who thought like he
did and could discuss something a little more interesting than the latest stuff
they bought or the latest sports team. He also found girls who could talk about
something deeper than who did their nails and where they bought those cute
shoes – ugh!
A great
place to find socialization for teens is from the MENSA society. They will find
others who get their jokes and think like they do. In the Kansas City area it
is called the Mid-America MENSA group at http://www.mamensa.org.
Children are always welcome at all MAMENSA activities. Plus there is a national
special interest group (SIG) for teens, and a Brightkids email resource for
other ages. For more information, contact the Gifted Children Coordinator at giftedchildcoord@mamensa.org.
Sometimes
gifted teens are depressed from a sort of arrogance about themselves compared
to others around them. They know they can out-think their peers and many
adults, and have impatience with others. (Studies show that intelligent people
can make the worst bosses when they won’t listen to any other point of view.)
Along with this arrogance can come a hopelessness about the state of the world
and a reason for being.
The
interesting thing about teen depression is that it is interspersed with moments
of fun joviality, masking the true underlying feelings. Teens can go to a party
and have a great time, then come home and feel the depression creep back in.
Parents and Educators need to be aware that a depressed teen has moments of
looking like a happy teen. All the symptoms of depression need to be viewed
together to see a pattern of depression.
With one
woman’s son, depression was manifest as anger. He would rage at the simplest
annoyances. He was angry that the world wasn’t his idea of perfect. When he
started verbally spiraling downward into more and more negative self-talk, she
realized her son needed professional help. He was headed for suicide. Her
intervention probably saved his life.
Parents of
gifted teens should make sure that they know what resources are out there to
help them when they can’t talk to mom or dad. One of the best places to find
hotlines and help is at teen central. Go to http://www.teencentral.net/Help/teenhelp.php?st=MO. Or you can go to the home page and search any state.
For Missouri, the website lists at least 6 different hotlines and agencies for
teen help. There are places teens can call in a crisis to talk. There are
resources for parents, too.
Another is
the 24-hour Crisis Hotline for abuse at http://www.mocsa.org.
Or call (816) 531-0233 on the MO side, and call (913) 642-0233 on the KS side.
Or the Teen Connection Helpline is at (913) 281-2299.
And a great
resource for boys and girls is the Boys Town, which can be reached 24 hours a
day and 365 days a year. They have a free crisis hotline. Go to http://www.BoysTown.org for more information.
One way to
help gifted teens out of depression or to avoid depression is to teach them
gratitude. When we can be thankful for the gifts in our lives, large and small,
we are happier. This helps to keep the arrogance at bay, too, so that we can
enjoy other people.
Remember
that being gifted is just that – a gift. We didn’t personally do anything to
get a great memory and logic, it was given to us. We have nothing to be
arrogant about because our giftedness isn’t a personal accomplishment, just a
gift. We can be proud of our achievements without being smug (thinking we’re
better than others).
Gratitude
for the little things in life helps us and our gifted teens see the good and
focus on the positive. It helps us understand what’s truly important and what
isn’t. Gratitude can be developed and we can learn that the glass is more than
“half-full” in our lives.
Creativity
can alleviate ennui and the blues. Encourage teens to be creative. A wonderful
website for budding inventors and scientists in Boing Boing found at http://www.boingboing.net with lots of techno gadgets and ideas. They also publish
a magazine called MAKE. On their website, MAKE magazine was giving away free
PDFs of the projects they demoed on The Martha Stewart Show on 15 July 2009. Go
check out what they currently may be offering!
Exercise and
physical activity can boost endorphins and serotonins in the brain. Go for a
natural high! Shut off the video games and get your teen active.
I also
strongly suggest keeping teens free from porn. Porn can be addicting and
depressing. I’ve seen a porn addiction lead to suicidal tendencies many times.
Studies show that a twelve-year-old only needs two weeks to become addicted to
porn. Help your teen stay away from such a soul-crushing addiction. It will
affect his (or her) relationships for life. (Remember, anecdotal exceptions-to-the-rule
are not the rule.) Why risk it?
Note: if
your teen needs medical help for depression, get it. You can’t change your
brain chemistry by out-thinking it, just like you can’t think your pancreas
into making more insulin.
Now about
gifted girls when they reach the teenage years: Why do gifted girls play dumb
with their peers?
I agree
whole-heartedly with the recent study (June 1, 2009) at the University of
Wisconsin- Madison- that definitely culture, not biology, accounts for the
differences in math performance among men and women. Professors Mertz and Hyde
say the data just do not support the stereotype. http://www.cardinal.wisc.edu/article/23150.
In fact in
elementary school, girls are usually ahead of boys in math. It isn’t until
middle school that girls start falling behind. And why, on average, do they fall
behind?
Early teen
years are when girls begin to realize the patriarchal order that exists in most
societies. They begin to see that they are quickly approaching womanhood and
what that means in relation to men. They quickly understand that boys have sensitive
egos about being ‘bested’ by girls. So they often downplay their intelligence
and physical abilities to win the attention of the boys. This is the time that
many gifted girls go into hiding, so to speak.
My 5th
daughter, the one who was in the Spectrum class for gifted kids, was ashamed of
being smart in middle school, where there was no gifted class. To fit in with
the other girls around her, she would refuse to show them her report card each
trimester. She never let on that she was getting straight-A’s. This made me
sad, and I did my best to help her see that it was okay to be smart. Luckily,
she outgrew this tendency and did very well in college. I am so proud of her!
And now she has the opportunity to help her gifted daughter live her fullest expression
of talent.
A woman I
know, Joyce, hosted a Japanese businessman’s visit at work, who brought his
wife on the trip to the U.S. with him. It was obvious that the wife spoke
better English than he did, but she held her tongue in his presence and only
spoke to Joyce when they were alone. Many cultures subtly- or not so subtly-
discourage a female from embarrassing a male in front of others. She has to
hide her talents to be accepted. In the name of “respect”, the often better
person has to play dumb. Isn’t that sad?
One woman,
Lee says, “Lucky for me, my 8th grade algebra teacher was a woman, Mrs. Barton,
who was also a mother of 4 children. She became my role model. She taught math
so well, so understandably, and juggled motherhood, too. From that moment on, I
excelled in math, going all the way through calculus in high school.
“Doing well
in math spilled over into doing well in physics and chemistry, too. College was
the obvious next step. I realized that I didn’t have to give up using my brain
to be a mother or give up motherhood to use my brain. Because of Mrs. Barton, I
have always excelled at math and science and motherhood.
“And I was
the older sister of several boys, so I was used to out-performing males. I had
a bit of an ego myself. In fact, I liked to prove that I was smarter and better
than most of the males around me. I figured a guy could like me and my
intelligence, or I didn’t need him.”
Girls today
have more social freedom to choose a professional career than the previous
generations did when they were young. However, most of the magazines for girls
and women still focus on hair, nails, clothes, and being sexy. So the messages
that other women editors in society
give to girls, still focus on traditional feminine interests.
This makes
it harder for science-and-engineering women to get their message heard. The
narrow focus to be attractive is stronger than to be intelligent, even in these
modern times. Society needs to blend the two. A smart woman can be attractive,
and she usually attracts a better caliber of men. The Exploring Your Horizons
(EYH) group has been doing a marvelous job of having women professionals mentor
young teen girls in math and science. Kudos to EYH!
In this way,
it is the social messages that girls get at puberty, not necessarily the
hormones or capabilities, which draw them away from mathematics in the
adolescent years.
To tell you the truth, the
misguided idea of “needing a boyfriend” to fit in is everywhere. It has a lot
to do with what the magazines and other media, even Disney and Nickelodeon
shows, push at our girls.
The "dating" ideas in
teen magazines often rival the porn mags. It takes away their childhood much
too young. Many models are young teens and pre-teens dolled up to look older
and sexier. What kind of message is that? It seems that some companies will do
anything to make a buck.
Those magazines and shows that
focus on all the other interests and abilities of girls- instead of being sexy-
should be applauded and supported by all of us, especially parents. One group
that promotes decent media “because our children are watching” is the Parents
Television Council(PTC) at http://www.parentstv.org. Their newsletter gives regular critiques about movies
and shows that help us make informed family decisions on media for our kids.
Another problem is mothers who
promote the objectifying of their daughters. Pride and vanity are very immature
needs. It's sad when they come from mother to daughter. The mothers are trying
to live through their daughters.
In the 1970s feminism used to
mean, not wanting to be a sex object,
as well as wanting equal opportunities. Now it seems to mean, put everything
out there for the whole world to see. This is not progress (though I'm sure the
makers of spring break videos and others are enjoying the show). What happened
to the original feminist ideas of self-respect and not being used? How can our
daughters be seen as equals in the workplace when they are so willing to be
mere decorations? This is not
empowerment.
Girls use their bodies to get
attention at younger and younger ages. But that's just it - they are being
used. They dress like Britney Spears and Madonna for school, which is unfair to
the male students and teachers. It takes the girls' focus away from developing
their minds and talents the way they should. They need to become women of
substance who contribute to society, not just eye candy, which is fleeting.
All of the conflicting messages
create great confusion for our girls. Teenagers and pre-teens don't have the ability
to fully understand cause-and-effect. Science has shown that brain chemistry
actually changes after age 18, giving their frontal lobe more ability to
project the long-term effects of their choices. So while our children are
adolescents, it is up to us adults to help them see the half-truths out there
for what they are. Adults have a responsibility to help girls feel their self-worth
for something beyond looks and boyfriends.
Taking away girls' childhoods is
also taking away their future possibilities in adulthood. Keeping themselves
free from bad choices now will keep their adulthoods open and free to be their
best selves.Parents need to give their girls the tools to combat peer pressure.
They need to teach them things they can say to their friends to get out of an
uncomfortable situation. They need to take time to show them how. They need to
help them have the inner strength to be true to themselves, even if it means
losing those friends.
Just because society has changed
doesn't mean that the natural consequences have changed. Adults need to make
sure that our girls know what those consequences are. There are deep emotional
costs to promiscuity, not just physical like disease or pregnancy. We need to
help steer them toward choices that keep their self-esteem and dignity in the
long run, so that they don't change the whole course of their future before they're even old enough to understand
what that future is.
And moms need to quit living
vicariously through their daughters to be sexy and popular. The short-term
reward is not worth the long-term cost. Sometimes parents just have to say “NO”
to certain media and clothes. Sometimes they just have to do what's best. Their
girls will understand later; when they have
daughters.
When I was a chemist in
aerospace in northern Utah, my company, Alliant Techsystems (Thiokol),
sponsored the EYH program. Several women engineers and I volunteered our time
to run hands-on workshops for girls in fun math and science applications. For 4
years I was a workshop leader for “Lotion Commotion,” which let the girls make
their own lotion with chemistry. They chose their own scents for their lotions,
as well as creative labels. My workshop was one of the most popular and usually
filled up first.
We also developed a workshop to
make purple dinosaur footprints with molds and plastics that the girls made
themselves. The dragon, Saphira, from the movie Eragon, was popular at the time. The girls loved it. And they got
to make molds of their own hands.
girls. I had many wonderful women from work to help me with the workshops, volunteering
their time on a Saturday to mentor girls. We ran 3 workshops, back to back, in each of 4
rooms. We had 18-20 girls in each workshop in each room, showing almost 240 girls the fun
of chemistry and math in one day. I loved it!
http://thegodfreymethod.com
