I really like this description from an article in salon.com; see the part i bolded:

 By the age of 12, my older son was back -- not "typical," in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders sense, but quirky and funny and quiet and odd. He could stretch his hand out and stay so still, a butterfly would land on it and quiver there for a moment before flying away. He struggled with reading and daily conversation but excelled at math, music and chess. It was time for us to let him become who he was and go back to our own lives, which the children did with great grace. But I was lost. There was fight left in me and it percolated, making me constantly uncomfortable. That store of energy I'd invested in the project of mothering seemed endless. So I upended my life -- all of our lives -- enrolling in graduate school, pouring all of my leftover zeal into teaching and reading and publishing, plus early mornings spent writing a book.

How do you describe your child?