Whatsnextmom, I could share almost exactly the same story about my ds (just turned 18) and his first semester of college. In his case he's not so much challenged to make confident decisions as he is allowing himself to be "out there," amongst people, asking questions, making connections, putting himself in situations that aren't familiar. And public transit: as an introverted perfectionistic country mouse, he has huge fears around public transit. He lives off campus, though within biking distance, so he's opted for self-propelled transportation whenever possible. Here's my favourite anecdote from this semester:
"Had an adult moment the other day. Realized I should check the mid-term exam schedule for my e-learning course. Looked it up, and it was in two days! Not a problem because it's an easy course for me, except that it was during my IAT106 lab, and it was at the [other] campus. So I went to my prof and got permission to be excused from the lab. I took the Skytrain, and transferred to a bus, and another bus at the most confusing interchange ever, and got to the campus and then I had to find the building. And then I had to find the room. And I found it, and I was on time."
And my over-achieving brag for him is
this kinetic typography project that he did in his principles of digital design course.
Over-achieving brag for middle dd: she has a 96% in AP Physics, the second highest mark in her new school, despite the fact that she had no prior physics courses, her old school not having offered Physics 11. (She's not the only student in this situation, but she's the only one with an A, and 40% of the students failed the midterm.)
For her, though, what I'm most impressed with is that she has started and is enjoying two new activities, gymnastics and ballet. As a 15-year-old absolute beginner who is by nature a Type A high achiever she had to find a mindset that allowed her to be open to learning and to enjoyment of things where she "pretty much sucked" (her words). The challenge is further compounded by the fact that her younger sister has had some previous instruction in gymnastics and is a bit of a hot-shot in ballet. And yet she's keen to learn, is enjoying working hard, and is not as far as I can see fixated on out-doing her sister. That's huge, because throughout much of the past decade she's felt very threatened by her sister's interests and abilities.
Dd11 is a bit of a golden child, precocious in almost all areas but also benefitting from natural social grace and amazing executive function skills, so it's hard to find a non-overachieving brag for her. The best thing has probably been watching her in the homeschool art classes recently: she doesn't have much natural ability in drawing or painting, nor does she enjoy them (those two facts being connected of course) and that's pretty much what they're doing this term, with a focus on figures and faces, her least favourite of all. You can see that she's playing along but not particularly engaged by the art itself: she's always looking for ways to wriggle sideways on a technicality on whatever the assignment is to avoid actually having to, say, paint a portrait. (eg. she'll paint a polygon with eyes and say she's experimenting with minimalism!) But I like that she's stayed cheerful and engaged with the other kids and the teacher and hasn't let her resistance to various parts of the work contaminate her emotions.
My over-achievement brag for her is
how far she's come in just a few months of ballet classes. I know she's no superstar of an 11-year-old in terms of her ballet skills at this point, but since until mid-September her only experience had been a set of about a dozen introductory classes with a group of 9- and 10-year-olds, she's come a long way.
Dd20 has been independent and away from home for so long that I don't really know enough about the details of her life to brag at all. She'll be home in a week and we'll catch up a bit more then.
Miranda