You need to look into twice exceptionality (2E). My daughter was diagnosed as gifted, and it masked her ADHD-PI in her neuro-psych test. Puzzles keep her interest because she enjoys the challenge, and the signs of inattentiveness weren't showing up on a puzzle-based assessment. Neither does a messy room or constantly lost items at school, insomnia or lack of impulse control/self-regulation. Giftedness does not disappear in adulthood, so I would suspect yours is a similar situation. I found this book useful: https://smile.amazon.com/Misdiagnosis-Diagnoses-Gifted-Children-Adults/dp/1935067435/
u/Necessary-Koala1840
This book might be helpful (there is a previous edition used for less $$) The author has several other books on 'gifted' kids that are helpful.
There is a strong correlation between the need for deep convos/getting bored by small talk with higher iq (120 up). I just learned that many "typical" adhd symptoms are similiar to feelings/thoughts and symptoms people with higher iq experience. Also the so called scanner personality. More than 15% of the population have a iq higher than 115, so its not that outlandish to think about it.
Maybe take a look into the topic. I found this book really helpful https://www.amazon.com/Misdiagnosis-Diagnoses-Gifted-Children-Adults/dp/1935067435
There is the very good book Misdiagnosis and Dual Diagnoses of Gifted Children and Adults, which has a very long chapter on giftedness and Aspergers. I can really recommend reading this book, it is very in depth both in differentiating between the two conditions, but also what do to when both conditions indeed are present.
There is a very good book on the topic of giftedness & autism, called Misdiagnosis and Dual Diagnoses of Gifted Children and Adults. There is a big overlap between the symptoms of autism/Asperger's and the symptoms of gifted people being in an environment that does not fit their needs.
The authors state that it can be very difficult to find out whether a person is gifted, or is autistic, or both. They recommend viewing the observed symptoms of autism under the lense of whether they are dependent on a certain environment. When the symptoms disappear when the person is in an environment more suited to gifted people, it is unlikely the person is autistic.
I must say, the fact that some people are more intelligent than others is an inconvenient truth, but it is very researched and proven. The same is true for IQ tests, even though it is not always easy to interpret the results, IQ scores say quite a lot about people.
There is the book Misdiagnosis and Dual Diagnoses of Gifted Children and Adults, which has a long chapter on differentiating ADHD and giftedness. I don't remember exactly what the authors write about ADHD, but in general they stress that problems from ADHD (and other mental health issues) should appear in all contexts. So a child being very twitchy and unruly in many different environments should be evaluated for ADHD, while a child being easily distracted and rebellious in school, but not at home should be evaluated for what leads to such behaviour in the school environment.
Concerning your coffee and adderall experiences, I think that is just the standard reaction to those drugs. Coffee makes you more active by turning up your heart rate, and making you more active in several psychological ways. This is exactly why many people drink coffee. And since you seem to not be used to caffeine, your reaction must have been quite strong. The same is true for adderall. It gets you in a sort of hyperfocus mode. This is why people abuse it for studying for exams etc.
If you have ADHD, it should show up in your life in places like work or university. If your only problem is procrastinating on projects, you should look at why you procrastinate on them. Tired from working or studying? Too much time spend on social media/TV/whatever? And if you think coffee makes you a more functional person, just start drinking it more. BTW, if a person with ADHD would drink a double espresso without caffeine tolerance, they would probably experience a very unpleasant episode of having too much energy and too little focus.
Concerning giftedness evaluation: In Germany, it is possible for a (child) psychologist to diagnose someone as gifted without a formal IQ test. This possibility exists for people like your son, who cannot be IQ tested for some reason. The evaluation would then look at your sons advanced abilities in school, his sensoric quirks, etc. I could imagine that something similar exists in the Netherlands. You could try finding out which universities do research on gifted people, they often have some kind of center for gifted people attached. And even if not, the researches still might be able to help in some way.
Concerning giftedness and ASD: The book Misdiagnosis and Dual Diagnoses of Gifted Children and Adults is a very informative read on the subject. The authors lay out what has to be taken into account for differentiating between giftedness masquerading as ASD and giftedness in combination with ASD. They stress that any disorder such as ASD should be seen in all environments (in school and at home, etc.), otherwise it has to be taken into account that the problems stem from the gifted child in conflict with the environment, not from a disorder. They also say that they consider an ASD diagnosis only correct if the gifted person is not able to have a socially appropriate relationship with anyone. Which I guess doesn't mesh with the more fluid view of ASD of the last few years. But I think it is relevant to mention it, since you say your son is sociable, but he knows no boundaries. I think it's reasonable to consider that this might be because he is highly energetic and wants to satisfy his curiousity.
IQ tests in children are less accurate than in adults. This is because children are not as experienced in taking tests, can be distracted more easily, do not understand the significance of the test and various other things. When evaluating children, it is thus very important to think about in how far the test results fits to the overall presentation of the child, and what the thought process of the child was when taking the test.
For example, when a child does not answer many questions at all, the reason can be that the child thought about each question they did answer very long to make sure the answer was correct. Vice versa, when a child breezes through the test, but most answers are wrong, it is a possibility that child was bored, and did not think about the questions too much.
In general, contrary what /u/Bakingflowers wrote, IQ is a very stable measure throughout life. Only things like heavy brain damage can change your true "general intelligence", and not for the better. Since you scored high on several IQ tests recently, it is very likely that the evaluation when you where younger did not give you a correct estimate of your IQ due to your depression and distractedness.
Concerning Dyslexia and Dyscalculia, but also your history with depression and anxiety, I can recommend you the book Misdiagnosis and Dual Diagnoses of Gifted Children and Adults. It gives an overview of all the psychological issues that can have an interrelationship with giftedness, and also how to evaluate them with giftedness in mind.
Misdiagnosis and Dual Diagnosis of Gifted Children and Adults is a very relevant book about many health issues gifted people face.
Check out the book Misdiagnosis and Dual Diagnoses of Gifted Children and Adults. It has lots of information on being twice exceptional. The author also wrote a shorter article here, which is more focused on misdiagnosis.
Lived experience, mom experience, and licensed psychologist here (but not YOUR psychologist).
This was the most helpful starting point resource on this for me: https://www.amazon.com/Misdiagnosis-Diagnoses-Gifted-Children-Adults/dp/1935067435
I found the other book. I haven;t looked thorugh it yet.
https://www.amazon.com/Misdiagnosis-Diagnoses-Gifted-Children-Adults/dp/1935067435
I'm DMing you.
I can highly recommend the book Misdiagnosis and Dual Diagnosis of Gifted Children and Adults. It has a long chapter on ASD and giftedness.
I think what is important is to listen closely to your son to find out what his emotional state is. Gifted children often face boredom, disappointment and loneliness. Boredom because they are not challenged in school, and it is not that easy to get a challenge elsewhere. Disappointment because they are often told "Wait until day X, then we will do the interesting things", and either day X never comes, or it comes and it turns out it's just as boring and now you have to wait for day Y. Loneliness, because it is hard (not impossible) for gifted children to connect with their peers, which can be very troublesome in a school environment.
These problems often fly under the radar, both because parents and teachers underestimate how well a gifted child with serious problems can perform in school, and because they get mistaken for puberty issues. So if your son complains about school, or his grades get worse, or whatever else might happen, I recommend looking closely at his problems to see where there are coming from.
Then there is the question how you can help your son to get the challenge he needs. I think it is very useful to thing strategically about this, even if some people might see this as pushy. Since your son seems to be interested in engineering, you can find out for example what robotics competitions for children exist where he could take part. Such competitions are hard if you have to start entirely from scratch, so helping him to learn some engineering things might go a long way. Similarly, you could look for STEM summer camps or similar.
Besides going deep into a topic, you can also try to support your son in exploring different things. I don't think that forcing your son to do sports or to learn an instrument is the right way, but getting him to try new things is a good idea in my opinion, because gifted people often like to do many different things. And, of course, you can look for things that maybe tie into his interests.
For his 2e issues, do you know the book Misdiagnosis and Dual Diagnoses of Gifted Children and Adults? I think it is basically a mandatory read, since there are many things that even many psychologists get wrong.
Hey, I studied maths for 7 years at a German university, finishing with a masters degree, and am now getting another degree in art history, so I think I can relate to many things you write.
I think that in physics, there are many students who are feeling just the same as you. Physics is an insanely difficult, and sometimes unfair topic to study. On the one hand, you have to learn a lot of physical intuition, on the other hand you have to learn a lot mathematics that is often not explained correctly. This is why, when you listen closely, physics lectures are full of gaps, and weird leaps of logic, that you are just supposed to ignore because "the physics makes sense".
I could imagine that you are a person who notices such gaps, and gets annoyed by them, at the minimum subconsciously. In the same vein, people who seem to understand everything sometimes understand less, because they don't even see the gaps. Then there are crazy people who do physics 15 hours per day, but even those do not understand everything.
I don't know how things work at your university, would it be possible to talk to some higher semesters through the Fachschaft or something. During my time, there was an abundance of higher semesters happy to share a lot of important stuff about maths and physics, but this was pre Covid.
On the topic of failing to do calculations, do you think it is more a mathematical problem or a psychological problem? The expectations what you have to solve in some physics classes are insane, physics students often have to be better than math students in solving differential equations and integrals, and with worse tools, even. But it should also be considered that you are fed up with physics at this point, at least with some part, so you should think about what part of physics it is that repulses you (more the experimental or the theoretical side,etc.).
And, of course, not being able to concentrate and to do things you used to be able to can be a symptom of depression, or at least something related to it. I personally struggle a lot with the structurelessness of the current Covid situation, I don't know how you are coping with that. The social situation is similar difficult at the moment, it is hard to meet new people, and the people that catch your attention in Zoom seminars are often annoying. And another thing that gifted people often struggle with, and which can have serious psychological consequences is boredom. If your university throws a lot of run of the mill differential equation stuff at you, you might be too bored to solve them.
On the topic of societal and philosophical interests, it was very similar for me, I am very interested in aesthetics. I tried for years to talk about that to my math friends, but I think in the end, 90% of all science students simply don't care about that. There are some that do, but they are kind of hard to find. What I wish I did more was to go to seminars and lectures from the Geisteswissenschaften. It turns out, if you ask nicely, you can get into more or less every seminar or lecture your university offers, including societal and philosophical ones (psychological are harder, because of the NC).
On the topic of giftedness and ADHD/autism, I can recommend the book Misdiagnosis and Dual Diagnoses of Gifted Children and Adults.
There is a very good book on the topic of giftedness & ADHD/ASD, called Misdiagnosis and Dual Diagnoses of Gifted Children and Adults. There is a big overlap between the symptoms of ADHD or ASD and the symptoms of gifted people being in an environment that does not fit their needs.
An example would be a child that is bored in class, so the child ignores the lesson and runs around in the classroom. This can look very much like ADHD, but if this behavior disappears in other contexts like at home, music lessons, it is likely that the behavior has do to with giftedness and not ADHD. For ASD, it can be the same: A gifted child who is interested in metallurgy, and who endlessly tells his mom what happens when you melt down different alloys can look very much like a child with ASD. But if this interest is linked to a bigger interest, like in engineering or the bronze age, and if the child loves to connect with people who know about such topics, then the interest is unlikely to be linked to ASD. ASD special interests tend to be very singular.
That does not mean that your child can't have ADHS or ASD. But it is important to match the right treatment to the right condition, otherwise you risk the treatment not having the desired effect.
For helping your gifted child, as I have hinted at, it is important that your son is in the right environment. This environment should make it possible for your son to follow his interests, and to learn what he wants to learn. Without knowing what you have access to, is is a little bit hard to make specific recommendations, but with your sons interest in engineering, I could imagine he would enjoy courses where children learn to craft something, to build an RC car, etc. This is more or less what is meant by challenging him, to give him a space where he learns that through investing time and effort, he can do the things he wants.
Another thing that is very important is to give your son the possibility to meet other gifted children, or at least other people who can be true peers to him. Gifted children often have trouble in their social development, because there are many frictions when they interact with children who are not gifted. If you have the chance to send your son to a gifted summer camp, this is great. But also, if there are children that remind you of your son or with whom your son interacts well, you should foster those relationships. These children often will turn out to be gifted as well. If you get deep into any hobby imaginable, it will be a chance to meet other gifted people.
Addressing the question of overwhelming your son, I think it's very important that you do not overprotect him. Figuring out what exactly overwhelms him and working around that is fine, but in general, gifted people need a lot of input, so sheltering them too much is often bad. Your son needs to encounter reasonable challenges so he can learn how to overcome those challenges, and how to be a reasonable adult later. Average people get those challenges in school, but gifted people can go through school without any effort, so the challenges need to come from somewhere else.
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There are some research papers that have shown a relationship between a more androgynous "gender identity" and giftedness: [1], [2]. Also, sadly, mental health professionals often glance over giftedness related issues and do not take them into account in their diagnosis. The book Misdiagnosis and Dual Diagnoses of Gifted Children and Adults gives an overview of how giftedness can influence psychological evaluation. While it does not say anything about gender identity, the authors stress that giftedness should be taken into account in any diagnosis.
While I have never struggled with gender identity and I have always had fairly normal gendered interests for a man (heavy metal, action movies, computer games, etc.), I always had a strong feeling of not fitting in, of being different than my (male) peers, and that my life is wrong in some strong, but intangible way. I only found out with 26 that this was because I was gifted. Since then, I have changed my life and have done a radical career switch, which has greatly improved my life satisfaction, and has made my intangible feelings go away.
This is a very common occurrence in the life of gifted people (just google "giftedness depression" or similar things), so I can definitely understand why your therapist wants you to explore your giftedness. I wouldn't go as far as saying that your giftedness is definitely the cause of your disphoria, but it should be looked into how it influences it.
Giftedness can actually look like autism, ADHD and the various personality disorders you mentioned. See this article. The authors also wrote a book, which I have read and which I found quite insightful.
A point that the authors make in the book is the following: If a person has a disorder like autism, the disorder should affect them in all contexts. So if a person can relate to other people that share their interest, but not to coworkers, it is unlikely the person has autism. And if a child misbehaves in school or is distracted, but can function just fine in other contexts, it probably is not ADHD or oppositional defiant disorder.
The same goes for symptoms. Having trouble relating with other people can be a symptom of autism, but if you don't have any symptom that usually appears in autism, it is probably not autism.
That said, the things you describe fit giftedness very well. Not being able to relate to other people, being defiant in school, being unstructured in your learning, being bored by repetition are all things that are very common in gifted people. That you where identified as gifted at one point also fits this explanation, even if you believe the IQ test you where given was bogus, having scored extremely high on it still is very relevant.
There is the book Misdiagnosis and Dual Diagnoses of Gifted Children and Adults, which has a quite long section about ADHD. The authors also wrote an article about the topic here. I have the book and found it quite insightful, even though i don't have ADHD, so I can't tell you how much it will fit to your perception of the condition. It is mostly directed at professionals, so it will surely tell you what questions to ask your psychiatrist, if you eventually get one.
For more practical advice, I think it is important to find out where your problems lie. Gifted people in university often have problems with the following things:
Can you relate to any of these things?