Posts

Showing posts from May, 2021

When to tell a PDA child (young or old) of their diagnosis

Image
I’ve often come across parents saying their kids have rejected their PDA diagnoses; as well as parents of adult children who outright refuse to consider the idea of being PDA at all. I believe it best to be cautious about disclosing PDA (or other diagnoses) to PDAers. I’m not saying that information should be totally withheld, but that I think it’s important to bear in mind that we PDAers (both kids and adults) are likely to totally reject labels. This is a fundamental aspect of our PDA demand avoidance. This is contrary to current autism best-practice wisdom, which states that children should be told of their diagnoses immediately because they will have already realised they are different to their peers, so concealing diagnoses withholds necessary information for helping them understand why they’re different. However, I don't believe this is generally best practice for PDA kids. Although PDA is classed as as an Autism Spectrum Condition, it’s known that some autism strategies are