The Ferrari Challenge: Why Conventional Parenting Fails Gifted and Sensitive Kids, and What Actually Works

Why does your bright, capable child fall apart over things that seem so small, and why does nothing in the parenting books seem to help?

You know the cycle. The meltdown over a homework problem they could solve in their sleep. The perfectionism that turns a simple project into a tearful standoff. The school calling again, while you sit wondering how a child this brilliant can be struggling this much. Friends tell you "all kids do that." Family suggests you're not firm enough. And that voice in your head keeps second-guessing you, wondering whether you're somehow getting it wrong. But there is a way out of this cycle.

Gifted and sensitive children experience the world with extraordinary intensity. Their emotions run deeper, their senses are sharper, and their minds move faster than most adults expect. This is what makes them remarkable. But it's also what makes conventional parenting advice, designed for neurotypical development, ineffective at best, and often counterproductive. The result is a painful mismatch: parents walking on eggshells, teachers who see defiance where there's overwhelm, and children who begin to believe something is wrong with them.

Sarah Strouthopoulos, founder of Confident Kids Coaching International, has spent over 25 years as a master educator, gifted specialist, and kids' life coach helping hundreds of families navigate this exact terrain. She is also a mother to a profoundly gifted child, and has lived this journey herself.

In this session, Sarah introduces her foundational framework for understanding what's really driving your child's meltdowns, perfectionism, and social struggles, and why these behaviors are often signs of depth, not dysfunction.

You'll learn how to regulate your own emotions first so you can be the calm presence your child needs, decode the real message behind intense reactions, and build the kind of trust and connection that lets gifted kids step fully into who they are. You'll leave not with another set of rules that don't fit, but with an approach designed for the extraordinary mind your child actually has.

Sarah Strouthopoulos is the founder of Confident Kids Coaching International and a master educator, gifted specialist, and certified kids' life coach with over 25 years of experience. She holds a Master's degree in Education from Lesley University and spent two decades in the classroom, first as an elementary teacher and later as a gifted specialist, before training as a certified coach through the UK-based Kids Life Studio. Sarah specializes in helping gifted, twice-exceptional, and sensitive children transform their intensity and big emotions into confidence, connection, and calm, while equipping their parents with the tools to support them. A mother to a profoundly gifted child herself, Sarah has guided hundreds of families internationally to overcome meltdowns, perfectionism, social struggles, and academic underachievement, helping gifted children and their parents move from daily overwhelm to lasting family flourishing.

To find out more about Sarah's work, visit her website: https://confidentkids.us/

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