Grant: Master's Award: Canada Graduate Scholarships

Parents of twice exceptional children (P2eC) face unique challenges in raising children who have significant disabilities, yet are also gifted (Caicedo, 2014; Whitmore, 1980). Self-compassion (SC) has been shown to be a powerful source of coping and resilience, and is linked to positive mental health (Trompetter, de Kleine, & Bohlmeijer, 2017), health-promoting behaviours (Dunne, Sheffield, & Chilcot, 2016), and coping with stress (Barlow, Goldsmith Turow, & Gerhart, 2017). I want to listen to the lived experiences of P2eC to gain a greater understanding of how SC affects their lives. P2eC will be recruited to complete a survey to identify those who are highly self-compassionate. P2eC measuring high in SC will participate in individual interviews with open-ended questions to learn more about their experiences. A team of three or more researchers will read, listen to, analyze, and summarize the interviews in a variety of ways using the Listening Guide protocol (Gilligan & Eddy, 2017). Layers of voices, both those being expressed and those being silenced, will be listened for in order to gain a deeper understanding of how SC affects parenting, relationships, and daily living for P2eC. My hope is that these insights will inform future directions for providing support and strength-based coping strategies. This exploratory research will aid in providing both preventative and resiliency supports to foster better health and life outcomes for families with twice exceptional children.