It has been a year since the pandemic caused havoc, chaos and culminating to eventual acceptance that this will be our norm for now, full of anxiety and stress. Most children and families have adjusted to our pandemic norm, from online learning, zoom meetings, parents/guardians turning into homeschool teachers whilst working from home, and having to adhere to safety protocols on a daily basis, whether taking a walk outside your neighborhood, or going into the grocery store.

Because of such added stress and anxiety, parents and children need some type of support, activity or other types of de-stressors to be able to cope.

Below are some articles, podcasts, reading materials to help parents and their children on how to cope and maintain a healthier social, emotional and mental well being: from tuning in to funny and silly podcasts to alleviate or ease the tension and sadness, to hearing and learning how children can be supported emotionally. These resources are found on our Gifted Resource Center webpage.

This is a podcast about raising kids who love learning. Listen to how others help inspire kids to view their world with play, passion and fascination. Podcasts such as talks about self-care and that parents must take care of themselves in order to take care of their children. But what about our kids, especially those who are gifted and twice exceptional? How do we help them learn coping skills and emotional regulation? How do we help them identify what they need to take care of their own bodies and souls?

The Deep End is a blog written by Stephanie Tolan, which she hopes will help create a space to discuss the needs and challenges of being a gifted child. A recent blog post 鈥淲ellbeing 鈥� A No Limits Approach鈥�, talks about what does wellbeing mean to children with non-ordinary minds and non-ordinary needs, and more than that鈥攃hildren living, suddenly, like the rest of us, in utterly non-ordinary times

The Fringy Bit is a website started by the parents of three 鈥渇ringy鈥� kids. They use this term to describe children who are gifted and those who experience other forms of neuro-diversity. Through their website, they have created a blog and podcast, focusing on creating a community for the parents of gifted children. Heather Boorman has a background in clinical social work, and her husband Jonathan is a licensed marriage and family therapist. Enjoy their bonus podcast episodes on 鈥淨uarantine Quips鈥�, that include short episodes talking about strategies, support, silliness and whatever else comes of Heather and Jon鈥檚 mouths and minds.

Help your gifted child embrace their uniqueness. In this workbook, a therapist offers fun activities and strategies to help children ages 7 to 12 boost self-confidence, reduce stress and overwhelm, and balance emotions.

Designed to provide support for the difficult job of parenting and teaching gifted children, “Emotional Intensity in Gifted Students: Helping Kids Cope With Explosive Feelings” provides the resource parents and teachers need to not only understand why gifted children are so extreme in their behavior, but also learn specific strategies to teach gifted children how to live with their intensity.

This blog provides resources for gifted children who struggle with anxiety. In addition to posts and discussions specific to giftedness and anxiety, the site also offers a purchasable 鈥淭aking Time for Me鈥� journal to help children manage their anxiety through mindfulness and gratitude.

TiLT Parenting was founded in 2016 by Debbie Reber as a podcast and community aimed at helping parents raising differently-wired kids do so from a place of confidence, connection, and joy. Debbie is passionate about the idea that being differently wired isn鈥檛 a deficit 鈥攊t鈥檚 a difference. She hopes to change the way difference is perceived and experienced in the world so these exceptional kids, and the parents raising them, can thrive in their schools, in their families, and in their lives. Check out the podcast with Dr. Michele Borba on 鈥淗ow to Help Kids Thrive in an Anxious World鈥�.

Understood is dedicated to shaping a world where millions of people who learn and think differently can thrive at home, at school, and at work. Several featured resources are available such as 鈥淗ow to help your child manage a fear, 6 signs your child is resilient鈥�.

This book by Allison Edwards guides readers through the mental and emotional process of where children鈥檚 fears come from and why they are so hard to move past. Edwards focuses on how to parent a child who is both smart and anxious. She brings her years of experience as a therapist to offer fifteen specially designed tools for helping smart kids manage their fears.

Additional Resources:

CDC鈥檚 Stress and Coping webpage provides resources and information on how to deal and cope with stress, such as coping with job stress, adults experiencing stress from Covid-19, responding to loss, and coping and support for children.

CDC developed the to help support parents, caregivers, and other adults serving children and young people in recognizing children and young people鈥檚 social, emotional, and mental health challenges and helping to ensure their well-being.

The word unique is very often misused in our country. It means 鈥渙ne of a kind.鈥� So something has to be either unique or not unique. It can鈥檛 be very, or especially, or extraordinarily. And I cannot be more unique than thou.

I define the term to begin this post because it鈥檚 important to start with the understanding that every single human being is unique. Even among identical twins, the two humans who can fit under the category of 鈥渕ost alike,鈥� the individuals are not actually identical, as any pair of them will attest. Their genetic makeup may be the same, but their experiences are inevitably different, so the adjustments to attitude, belief, and feeling that those different experiences create lead them down paths that, no matter how similar, are clearly separate. This is what keeps the concept of cloning from being the creation of identical beings. There, too, different experience would inevitably create separation. Difference.

The reason I think this word and the principle it represents is worth writing about in this particular moment is that the culture we live in, though it has always found differences tricky to deal with, is especially challenged just now. We categorize people by differences, and then all too often treat people (and value them) not as individuals, but by category, as if that is all we need to know. The attributes we use to create those categories are infinite. Sex/gender, age, skin color, athletic prowess (or lack thereof), religion or belief system, social status, income level, nationality. Well, you get it. Infinite categories.

This categorizing is natural to humans; it can and does provide us useful, even necessary information. But it can also lead us astray. Judging people by the category we鈥檝e assigned them can be harmful, to them and to us. While creating a category shows us differences, it simultaneously helps us forget that many more aspects of humanity are shared among us all. It enhances our human tendency to think in terms of them and us, and can exacerbate competitiveness and encourage hostility. This has happened, for instance, through all the decades since Gifted became a category, and the arguments about it continue without pause. These arguments often lead both those inside it and those outside of it to oversimplify complex realities and downplay or ignore entirely basic human needs on both sides.

In 2012 I wrote a blog post on The Deep End titled It is much longer than this post, but is closely related. The 鈥渨ho鈥� of a person is the individual beingness–uniqueness. The 鈥渨hat鈥� is a category. That piece, the second one I posted on my then brand new blog, was written for its intended audience, those within not just the gifted category, but the highly to profoundly gifted category. After more than 30 years interacting with parents (and being one myself) I knew all too well how easy it can be to lose sight of the individual beingness of one鈥檚 child while trying to be sure that his or her category needs are met.

I stand by that blog post today. But I am also acutely aware of those 鈥渂asic human needs鈥� that all humans have no matter what categories they fit into, or how those categories are perceived by those outside of them. Having moved to upstate New York to be closer to family, I now spend rather a lot of time in New York City, and I am constantly reminded, as I travel on its subways, of the uniqueness of every single human individual鈥攖he extraordinary differences among us! For right now, when our country is wracked by hostility over our differences, I think we more than ever in my own recent memory need to do our best to wrap our heads (and more especially our hearts) around the paradox inherent in the original motto proposed and established by the founding fathers in 1776 that used to be on our currency鈥�e pluribus unum. We are many. We are each unique. And we are also One.

Quantum physics tells us we are 鈥渟tar stuff.鈥� And yet we are vastly different from stars. It tells us that we are energy because everything is energy, that we are therefore related not just to each other, but to elephants and mice and trees and orchids. Our kids have the capacity to 鈥済et this,鈥� but we need to 鈥済et it鈥� as well and do our best to hold onto it even as we work for the benefit of our children鈥檚 particular category.

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