The foundation of a gifted individual’s mental health is h/h ability to accept the reality of their giftedness and use it in gratifying ways.Among the many nges gifted individuals face, acknowledging their giftedness is often the most difficult.The excitement of using their lightning fast intellect and many extra cognitive abilities for prodigious spactacular accomplishments and an awareness of the future potential doesn’t offset the conflicted feelings gifted individuals have about what it actually feels like to be gifted as well as how they would like or not like to be recognized or identified as gifted.Failure to resolve these conflicts about the many levels of what it means to be gifted is often the source of mood swings, anxiety, depression and self defeating behavior.It is no surprise that gifted individuals can develop serious mental health when their educational situation doesn’t meet their needs for advanced enriched intellectual stimulation; their peers can’t provide worthwhile interactions and parents who don’t ‘get’ giftedness.What has surprised me during 40+ years of coaching, counseling and providing therapy for gifted individuals is that gifted, exceptionally gifted and profoundly gifted individuals can develop serious mental health issues even under the best circumstances: they can still deny, disavow the reality of their giftedness even when they have available an enriched and accelerated curriculum, specialized extra-curricular activities, parents who “get” and value giftedness and friends excited to have a gifted individual in their group. What are some of the issues that gifted individuals have to address to insure good mental health? The ” inner experience” of being gifted. Early reading allows a gifted individual to use a prodigious intellect in exciting ways that develop critical thinking, concept formation and discovery through metaphor. This can be an exciting experience but it can also feel like a mysterious out of body one – one they can’t control or turn off. Further distress comes when they realize they’ve gone beyond even their smartest friends and their left their childhood before indulging in it’s carefree silly pleasures.When they realize they’ve entered adulthood prematurely they can also feel guilty.Conflicts about how to position themselves socially are another source of anxiety about being gifted. Belonging to a group can be appealing but the psychological price may feel too burdensome. Gifted individuals often wonder how much intense envy, jealousy they can endure. How can I fit in without limiting myself and risk depression.How do I retain my authenticity as gifted. For gifted individuals the process of learning can be a mixed one.They can enjoy the magic of their intuition, imagination, automatic insights, clairvoyance and special aesthetic sensitivities allows them to absorb information as it’s being presented. But actually feeling about how this all works and realizing even their smart friends can’t operate like this can shift simultaneously between the magical and the weird. Instead of feeling like wonderful gifts these uncanny abilities can lead to false beliefs that they might be ” on the spectrum” and are seriously neurological impaired. Maintaing and restoring a gifted individuals mental health.Parents can help their gifted child maintain a healthy attitude toward their giftedness by being a united team. Working to agreement about how much they value giftedness and how many resources in time and money they’re willing to devote to its development. Understanding the dramatic ups and downs of gifted development helps reassure a gifted child when h/s wants to give up on being.In my efforts to restore mental health in gifted individuals i’ve learned to approach the topic of giftedness obliquely:Its only after a solid therapeutic relationship has been developed that the topic of giftedness can be addressed.Trust starts as I focus on alleviating their most troublesome symptoms.If they are debilitating short term use of medication may make sense. This is always the patient’s choice. It’s reassuring to explain that even very dysfunctional symptoms do not mean a psychiatric syndrome has developed.They may simply be a reflection of a gifted crisis. Counseling and coaching are the next steps in developing practical solutions for restoring normal functioning. Intensive therapy sessions are used to get to the underlying causes of the symptoms and the crisis. Eventually this leads to the issue basic issue : the conflict a gifted individual has about being gifted and how S/H might want to incorporate into their daily lives. Helping a gifted individual explore these issues is a key factor restoring their mental health.