Are You Twice-Exceptional?

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For those unfamiliar, the term "twice exceptional" refers to individuals who are simultaneously gifted in one area (academic, artistic, athletic, etc.) and disabled in another (learning disability, executive functioning deficits, emotional disability, etc.) I have a full-scale IQ of 120, and a verbal IQ of 141, which are classed as mildly to moderately gifted, and by the same token, I have executive functioning issues around organizing, planning, prioritizing, intuiting when things need to be done, and a mathematical ability that is as bad as my writing ability is good.

This mix of traits is very frustrating, because my deficits prevent me from being able to show the full extent of my gifts. In high school, my AP English teacher said I walked out of his class every day understanding 80% more of the material than the other students, but when I took the standardized AP English exam at the end of the year, I only scored a 3 (out of 5; an average score) because my slow processing speed and poor organization prevented me from demonstrating what I really knew.

Right now I'm unemployed because, although I have a very good track record for my written work (at my last job I copyedited and made corrections to a grant proposal my supervisor wrote, and subsequently ensured that she got the grant), I can't keep a job because I get so overwhelmed and confused by the organizational requirements and expectations that I should just "know what I should be doing". It's quite depressing at times.

What about you all? Are any of you classified as twice-exceptional?

I don't know if I fit into this group. I am artistic - that's a given. I play guitar, bass, drums, keyboards - all of which were self taught. Also taught myself how to write and produce songs as well as program music using a computer and Cubase. I've written several books including two novels, nine novellas, one book of non-fiction, about 40 short stories, six screenplays, my online blog, and a handful of poems.

Disability-wise, I'm a social failure, so I don't know if that counts. At 56 I'm still single and childless and, for the most part, considered a loner. Never been to a funeral and was dragged to one wedding in my entire life. I've guessed my IQ to be around 120-140, but those were through online tests, not real life psychological observations.

Although I do not have any recent official testing, I believe that I likely meet this definition. I was told that my IQ is above average after testing in high school. People often describe me as the smartest person they know, but do not understand my legendary disorganization.

i never knew there's a word to describe this. i definitely feel like one. i have an iq of 139, which makes me able to learn stuff quicker than others, but i lack in social and emotional skills. i used to excel at soccer (i just love to think about the opponents strategies so i could easily defend my area and foil their plan) and i was getting good grades with minimal effort, but my anxiety prevented me from developing my passion any further. i was afraid of joining a team and i was scared of showing my potential to others (which is weird i might say)

I can totally relate. I have been called a type of savant in some areas but in other areas I completely suck. This, like you Startrekker has cost me almost every job I have ever had and I have had almost 50 jobs. I feel like I am this kind of person. I also did not know that there was an actual term for this. I am glad to know it.

Definitely. I seem to do fairly well in pretty much every intellectual or technical field, and even better in artistic fields, as long as a few conditions are met, though they often aren't. This is especially true when in some education system. Before I say anything further, I also have very poor executive functioning, as you've mentioned. I'd much rather wander and learn something naturally than sit down and force myself to learn something redundant to pass a class or get a promotion.

The first issue involves social cues and a struggle to conform to the desires (often unfair or unnecessary) of other people. I've always resisted any kind of direction from someone else, even at my own expense and when I later find I am wrong, because I can't see some immediate logical benefit. For example, I can be very good if I direct myself and make an income on my own, but working with a team or under a boss never goes well. I end up getting overwhelmed while trying to interpret their excessive reliance on social cues rather than actually doing the job.

The other issue is I need to have a complete and thorough understanding. Why am I doing this and what purpose does it serve? On top of that, if I have incomplete pieces of information, my brain will work to fill that incomplete information until it is met or until I abandon the field, whatever it may be. When I hit a barrier, where I'm unable to learn something further or unable to understand something completely, I tend to shut down. Math is especially difficult as it's full of incomplete information, or information which is formatted in an atypical way, just to trick you, especially on exams. Certain life sciences or natural sciences like chemistry are easier because they are logical, while arts are easiest for me because they often follow the least limiting rules while actually having some enjoyable outcome and benefiting everyone.

I was a gifted kid with a severe emotional disability. They told me once I could have skipped grades in school if only I didn't have the almost daily meltdowns.

I took the AP test in Biology and got a 5. Science and math were my best subjects while English I had a bit of trouble with because I think I had a learning disability relating to spelling and grammar.

To answer the original question, yes, I sure am 2E. Possibly the textbook example of it if you ask me, since the wikipedia artical describing 2E learners is exactly how I was growing up.

Main strengths are regarding rational thinking and visualizing stuff. That's why I do so well in organic chemistry, although I would also consider myself to be good at hurricane tracking and, on a more general level, most other scientific topics.

Main deficits are a lack of spatial awareness (most likely, that's where most of my social deficits originate) and being dyslexic with numbers.

I'll be the odd one out and say I'm not. I was mistaken for being gifted from the time I was an infant by teachers and my parents, but I'm far more average intellectually than I am exceptional, as testing has confirmed. My only above-average IQ score is verbal, which is 125 and is easily balanced out by the impairments also indicated by the test. I suppose my speaking skills and reading level have fooled people over the years. As for most artistic areas, I'm competent but not unusually skillful. I have my strengths, some of which are considerable, but I'm not exceptional overall.

I was never identified as such, but my profile of strengths and weaknesses do fit that description. I am working to use my strengths and improve my weaknesses to attain greater success and functioning in my life.

Yes. I was total crap in school, constantly bored out of my skull about the subjects and had uninspiring teachers until i got to college. I never had an idea what to become, except i wanted to go into the airforce, but when i was 15 i was already too tall (there was a height limit because of aircraft design so i didn't bother).

But i always had a knack for tinkering with computers and technology. I learned Basic by myself, then Assembler. I put PC computers together, then learned a few more programming languages. I borrowed books at the library about hacking, networking (Novell) and Unix systems (there were no linux back then) as the subjects thrilled me, and when i finally got to take a course in the subjects, i realised that i knew all this stuff pretty well.

At that point i unleashed my inner autodidact and ran loose onto various subjects. I also wrote programs that were better than some highly valued named companies could produce. I wrote network applications after being fascinated by sockets programming, among other things i wrote a lightweight text only webbserver that i used at work for support and an SMTP proxy that intercepted spam and rewrote the destination email address on a protocol level. I've also done some cryptography applications and security stuff too.

I know that i am a walking IT department, i can install systems, write code, setup databases, design GUI, take requirements, document procedures, communicate technical abilities as functionality to normal people so they understand, process video/images, plow through terabytes of data and visualize it to make it clear what is going on.

I have amazed myself over the years of what i could achieve by reading about stuff and tinkering with things. Professionally, i've done stuff that i never could have imagined. I have several ideas that i want to develop into commercial security products, but noone is willing to pay me for it so i let them linger.

Privately, i've played drums (alot better and faster than some professional ones), i've composed music and i'm really good at some types of games like flight simulators, i can also spend an entire day focusing on subjects i like (maybe that is the secret?).

And no, i have no problems with self confidence, i've been told several times that i'm really skilled in some areas. I find that lots of other people, like on linkedin, are just - talkers. They cannot achieve jack s**t.

In high school I tested in the 99th percentile in abstract reasoning (ravens matrices).
Quit high school after 5 years. Poor writing, poor vocabulary and rote memory skills.
Didn't know how to make friends with or talk to other kids.

I'm good at creative problem solving.
In the 80's I took some programming classes.
I loved programming and thought myself how to animate on an old commodore computer.
I did cobol programming for over 20 years.
Technically, I don't know much about computers at all. I just like the programming part.

Yes. But, since finding out I have autism, I've made great strides in my ability to socialize. It helped that I had an NT partner who would assist. As in discussing social situations.

Most certainly. My IQ is 140, which technically puts me in the highly gifted category and top 99.5%, however my emotional intelligence is appalling. My Empathy Quotent is an abismal 4 from 80. Unfortunately, despite a high IQ I've not excelled, I mean, I'm very good at my job but it's in a technical field with lots repetition and routine, but grades at school and university were lower than you'd expect - above average but not exceptional by any means. IQ is largely irrelevant anyway, it's only a way to measure the potential capacity for intelligence. My Emotional Intelligence on the other hand has certainly caused my a lot if problems over the years and I only realised how debilitating it's been since I realised I was Autistic, and looked back.

I find it helps to slow down social situations. NTs enjoy talking so let them. I can remember the entire conversation, but revealing that makes NTs uneasy, so I don't. Its like playing cards. Don't show your hand unless you have to. A lot of social interaction is intelligent guessing. Listening helps me figure out what is really going on.

I honestly don't know. Various people, including psychiatrists and my sister, have described me as very intelligent. I am much better verbally than non-verbally/spatially. My executive functioning is not good- NB organising and planning.

My social skills are seen as being very poor.