What is PDA
PDA is known as Pathological Demand Avoidance or Persistent Drive for Autonomy in more affirmative social models is a developmental nervous system disorder that up till now has been largely misunderstood and under and mis-diagnosed, frequently as Oppositional Defiance Disorder or ODD. It has been closely linked with autism as well as ADHD.
PDA is based in the nervous system and triggers the fight, flight, freeze or fawn mechanisms in response to perceived demands. Perhaps the most difficult thing to understand about PDA is the the PDA nervous system can and often does get triggered by things that most of us would not recognize as a demand. For example, we can all see that telling our child to go to bed is a demand - but so can their body signaling that its bladder is full and needs to go to the bathroom for example. Many kids struggle with listening to their body when they are overwhelmed by the demands it is placing on their nervous system. Each demand they encounter drains their energetic reserves and creates less and less resilience for the next demand.
Depending on the individual and the capacity a particular person has to demands can vary, and are influenced by situational factors as well such as the particular day, the environment, various physical states like illness (acute and chronic) as well as access to safe places, people, activities what help build back up their resiliency.
The PDA nervous system has two major presentations that can and often do feed into one another. The first is INTERNALIZED and the second EXTERNALIZED responses to demands.
The INTERNALIZED response can look like shutting down, selective mutism or going non-verbal, ignoring, dissociating, creating false realities or memories, negative self talk, self esteem issues, self harm, suicidality as well as people pleasing, fawning, including heavy masking and trying to “appear” happy, engaged and cooperative.
The EXTERNALIZED responses are sometimes easier to spot because the nervous system reaction here can be more visible and tend to be the behaviors that get kids into trouble both at home and at school and include things like yelling, screaming, hitting, throwing things, breaking things, and can look very extreme and often scares those around them.
The thing to remember with both of these INVOLUNTARY nervous system based responses is that they are not choiceful. They are survival based reactions to demands. In the PDA nervous system demands feel like we are about to be devoured by the proverbial lion and we MUST protect ourselves at all costs. The above strategies are the natural self protective mechanisms we develop when we have surpassed our threshold for resilience and capacity.
PDA can often look like
Non-compliance
Aggression
Violence
Absolute Refusal
Manipulative Behavior
Avoidance
Rigidity
Obsessiveness
Impulse Control Issues
Shut Down
Depression
Anxiety
Controlling Behavior
And More….
PDA Burnout
When someone with PDA is subjected to traditional approaches like parenting techniques that rely on more authoritarian frameworks (which lets be honest - almost all parenting advice still call upon the child to listen to the adult, even when its called gentle parenting and disguised as choices doled out by the parent - and coupled with educational environments that require compliance from students to be successful, the PDA kid is inundated with inescapable demands all day - everyday. In this situation burnout frequently occurs and both the child and the adults trying to care for the child are thrust into crises.
When your child reaches PDA burnout it is your child is at a BREAKING POINT and needs immediate and lasting interventions. The interventions we suggest below allow the nervous system to heal and begin building back to resilience. Remember that the process that led to burnout is a traumatic one and requires a trauma infrared approach to healing.
It is often helpful to think of a child in burnout the way we could a broken bone - we act swiftly to provide the body the environment and interventions it needs to begin the repair process for as long as it takes for the healing to be complete. Our nervous systems are no different - though the strategies we need to employ are much more subtle - and just as a cast is individualized to the person - the strategies can be tailored to the unique individual needing to heal from burnout. Support for parents, educators, mental health professionals alongside the individual children themselves is critical for healing to happen effectively.
PDA Burnout can often look like:
Debilitating anxiety
Intense mood swings
Absolute school refusal
Going non-verbal
Physical aggression
Threatening self harm
Violence
Extreme sensitivity
Withdrawal
Refusing personal hygiene
Refusal to eat
Sleep issues
Eloping
And more….
Recovery
The path to recovery is a radical one. It requires us to do things differently for our children's literal survival. We are called to be our children's biggest advocate at a time when they are the most vulnerable. The PDA nervous system requires immediate REST, AUTONOMY, and SAFETY to heal. This is truly only possible in a No Demand / Low Demand environment. Many families drop all non-essential demands - including demands that most of us think of as essential like showering and teeth brushing. The no demand environment can be thought of as triage - it wont stay this way forever and the extent and duration of how long it remains this way largely depends on the extent and severity of burnout.
One of the most misunderstood vehicles of recovery is screens. For a PDA kid screens can be incredibly regulating. They are in control of their online world - what shows they watch, for how long, who and how they interact with games, and content. Of course, we want you to create a safe environment for your child online with appropriate parental controls and safety measures, but allowing kids in burnout to “rot their brain on screens all day” could literally be the exact way they will find themselves back on the road to recovery.
We recommend taking a hard look at what demands you are placing on your child and keeping only those which are absolutely necessary and dropping the rest. This can look like dropping the demand of school, or taking baths or eating “healthy” foods, attending activities or hobbies, interacting with family or friends and so much more. This can be tricky as it's very easy to fall into justifying making our child bathe and brush teeth so they stay healthy, but the reality is they will not die if they don't bathe or brush teeth. This is the level to which we drop our demands directly correlates to the level of burnout we are talking about.
Each situation and each child is unique and creating the right low or no demand environment for your kid can be challenging. We are here to help. We provide whole family system support so you do not have to do this alone. We will support you as parents, educators, and mental health providers and help you navigate the questions, fears, and choices that naturally arise as you embark on this radical journey.
Your child is counting on you.
Comments