Non-violence allows me to acknowledge the depth of my pain and disconnect with my son, as well as his with me, while also laying out a path towards reconciliation. And I feel my professional life -- the one I left behind more than a year ago to care for my son -- gave me plenty of experience communicating complicated topics. Unsurprisingly, a white man in a position of power used his his neurotype as an excuse to hurt people. The first step to understanding this is to deconstruct the term “Pathological demand avoidance,” Henderson says.

It is like having building blocks and every bounce adds a block to the tower; which is great for those positive emotions, but when it is the negative ones, it can end in one or both of us having meltdowns. While I was trained to understand that the labels we use impact the individual we describe, and shape our society and culture’s perception of that individual or group, these concepts are no longer mere thought exercises for me.d. Anxiety driven behaviours expressed in attempts to maintain or regain autonomy including: avoidance, fawning (agreeing/people pleasing) followed by avoidance, quitting, ‘social manipulation’ such stating untrue information in the attempt to avoid demand, entering into role-play (‘being silly’), distraction, making jokes, ‘disruptive’ behaviours, stating they have sickness/injury with no evidence of this occurring, ‘controlling’/directing the actions of others, doing things in their own way, delaying or procrastinating.

And so many day to day things trigger PDA; gentle suggestions, advice, needing to get up and drink water, the demand of masking, a text message, wearing acceptable clothing, even advertisements! There’s an old saying ‘knowledge is power’ but I think there is a far more important benefit when it comes to autism or autism related conferences, and that is; ‘knowledge is understanding’. Of course, PDA kids aren’t bad — and parenting them doesn’t have to turn your home into a war zone, Henderson says. On my part, this violence was not intentional, but that does not erase its “intense, destructive force. Editor's Note: This article was originally published on March 6, 2023, and was last reviewed on March 7, 2023.The lack of understanding and empathy for people who are neurodiverse in our mental health services is shameful.

As such not much can be taken from Thompson’s personal account due to the uncertain nature of what DAP and cannot be generalised to the wider DAPer population. When he is feeling anxious at all, my son becomes very controlling; to the point of having control of how my whole body is positioned, where I sit and whether I talk or not. Recently, he has delivered training on DAP to postgraduate level and spoken internationally on the topic. We ask that you tell us if you have any concerns and respond to our questions or queries within the agreed time limits. As time went on, we adapted and changed our parenting style to a more child led style and the violence reduced until it was only happening when he was going through a development jump or growth spurt.Monitor your own communication for subtle demands — you’d be surprised just how many sneak into what we say, Thompson says. My daughter is PDA and uses manipulation to escape demands, but it seems like he has the more garden variety type of manipulation. Additionally, he's mean-spirited and hurts people for sport, defending it by saying it's a PDA characteristic. He would punch, scratch and kick me, regardless where we were or who we were with; even when I was lying in bed with him.

If a branch member fails to comply with the above they may be asked to leave the branch and will no longer be able to attend activities. Critical Reflections on the Pathological Demand Avoidance debate: A response to The Practice MK blog and discussion.

During E's time in this hellish environment, she would have frequent Autistic meltdowns, for which she was severely rebuked and invalidated.