No one understands

After sitting together in what almost seemed like a trance for at least an hour, they went downstairs to their little boy that was growing up way to fast for comfort. Jenny was the first to address him. "Hey honey, what are you doing?" Charlie looked up briefly before he replied, "Playing my game." Jenny looked at Jason and gestured for him to get down. The two of them joined Charlie on the floor, where he had chosen to play his math game, and as they played along they tried to address the subject of school. Jason was in charge of the next question and he asked, "Do you like playing this game?" Charlie nodded as he continued to focus on his game. "Then, what about school. Do you like going to kindergarten?" Charlie shrugged, looking just like Jason whenever he did the same, and said, "I guess." Jenny wasn't planning on letting him get away with just an 'I guess' and kept the subject going as she fired a series of follow up questions. "What do you like about kindergarten? Do you like it more than preschool? Are there things you don't like at kindergarten?"

Finally Charlie looked up from his game and looked at his parents. From the look on their faces and their odd behaviour, he could tell that something was going on. A bit hesitantly he answered Jenny's questions. "I like it the same as preschool. I like having someone to play with and I like my teacher but..." Before he continued his answer he looked up at Jenny and Jason's faces and he got a reassuring nod from both of them, making it easier for him to admit a truth he had been keeping to himself. "But, I don't like that no one understands the games I want to play and I don't like not having any real friends. I play with them and we have fun but I am just going along with whatever they want to do. Even the teacher looks at me differently. I always feel like I am saying something wrong when she looks at me like that. I thought kindergarten would be different but I still feel like I don't belong."

Jenny and Jason both felt the pain of hearing these words. Being confronted with the fact that their son was having an even harder time than they had when they were young. He was more advanced, he was more aware, which made his pain worse. Though they had clearly seen that he was enjoying himself and he his natural charisma had ensured that he was never short of any friends. But despite those smiles, there were struggles he was facing that he had never thought of voicing out to them. How long would they have gone undiscovered if they hadn't asked about them today?

Despite the sad words he was saying, Jenny couldn't help but be in awe for a moment. How far he had grown from the boy who would make sentences like 'Should I go with mommy? So you can feel better.'. Now his vocabulary had expanded tremendously and he had learned to speak in such full sentences, making you think he was at least twice or thrice his age. Learning it all from just studying his environment. As she was thinking about this in silence while Jason was talking to Charlie, getting him to elaborate on some of his answers, Jenny got an idea that was even more radical than the suggestion of the teacher. As if continuing the conversation where the talk had last left off before she had wandered off in her mind, and without a second thought she asked Charlie, "Then how would you like to go to a school where do understand? Where they understand you and your games. A school with gifted children just like yourself."

Jenny ignored the surprised look on Jason's face and looked straight at her son, who had stopped talking in the middle of his sentence after hearing his mother's question. Charlie lowered his eyes as he said in a soft voice, "But what about kindergarten?" Jenny looked at the boy with determined, unwavering eyes, which retained a touch of softness, as she responded, "Whatever you want honey. If you want to keep going, we will make it a part-time thing. If you don't want to keep going, you can leave kindergarten and go there fulltime. We want to do whatever is best for you and we want you to be happy. So, whatever that is, we will go along with it." Charlie's eyes grew. He never thought of this as options. He had assigned himself to his fate and hoped things would get better with time but now he was suddenly offered choices and solutions and he didn't really know what to do.

Jenny saw the confusion in his eyes and could tell her son had been overwhelmed with the information. So, while allowing him to let it all sink in, she told him about their talk today with his teacher. "To be honest, daddy and I were both there to pick you up today because we were called in by your teacher. She told us that she can tell you are a lot further than the other kids in your class. So, she suggested that you leave kindergarten and go to elementary school. Daddy and I don't want that because we want you to have a normal childhood and have the chance to grow socially and emotionally like other kids your age. So, we were considering letting you go twice a week and stay in your current class for the remaining days with assignments from elementary school. But if being in a regular kindergarten is making you unhappy, I will do whatever it takes to find a place where you feel like you fit in."