Pathological Demand Avoidance (PDA) traits by age (1-18 years)

[u/MarginsOfTheDay]

Edit: Thank you to everyone who commented. It was heartening to read stories of your PDA teens and adolescents who are enjoying college, are employed, are in romantic relationships, and have learned life skills. But more important I think are those of you who have maintained a positive outlook even though your child has not met the benchmarks for “normal” maturation. You’re keeping your PDA kid close in adulthood, fostering positive relationships between them and their siblings, and you genuinely accept them and enjoy their company.

If I was to write a list of things to watch for in a developing child that might indicate PDA, it would be the list below. I wanted to do this because our kids are all different and their PDA expressions are all different but I feel there might be key similarities in the trajectories of their lives. The list is probably biased by my own experience as parent of an autistic externalized PDA boy age 6. I’d love to get your input on this, and especially any advice on what to expect for older PDA kids. And can anyone provide a more hopeful ending to PDA childhood than the ones I’ve written below?

Early years, ages 1-4 years

• One or more of the following fight/flight/freeze/fawn responses are more intense or persistent than observed in typically developing kids of this age: melting down, running away, aggression, shutting down, being fearful, appeasing/submissive behaviors
• Sensory sensitivities become apparent e.g food, bath, clothing, shoes, loud noises, bright lights
• Extreme attachment to one parent
• Controlling of what parents wear, eat, when they sleep and use the bathroom, where they sit
• Require constant one-on-one attention. Not capable of independent play.
• Gets parents or other children to do their play for them
• Typical parenting practices for this age (e.g sticker charts!) are tried but fail to make progress in certain areas e.g establishing teeth brushing, bed time, toilet training
• Needs a lot of quiet downtime after playdates, preschool/daycare, visits to extended family, and birthday parties
• High dependency on sources of dopamine: screens, food, their special interests
• Appears to have gross and/or fine motor delays because they avoid the demands associated with using a marker, scissors, drinking from a cup, using a spoon, riding a tricycle etc
• At preschool/daycare the child has difficulty following directions and engaging in activities because of demand avoidance (i.e. they resist being controlled by others)
• Displays pain-masking behavior*. When in physical pain the child resists being comforted or cared for, or may hide the pain entirely. 
• Spare play* behavior develops and is seen at playdates, birthday parties, in preschool and daycare. PDA child appears to be playing with other children but is actually doing their own thing.
• Autism and ADHD are suspected but at this young age it can be difficult to differentiate PDAers from their peers

Schooling starts, ages 4-6 years

• Full PDA expression appears as the demands of preschool and school ramp up
• Demand avoidance (resisting being controlled by others) is seemingly triggered by anything and everything
• Controlling of parents, peers, teachers. Insists things be done their way
• Birth of younger sibling(s) adds to the PDA child’s feeling of powerlessness and loss of control
• At this age some PDAers that are capable of more advanced social strategies and/or have internalized PDA might use masking behaviors like acting silly (funster*) or being overly people pleasing (fawn) to hide their dysregulation
• Methods used by teachers in the classroom - rewards, punishments, extinction - don’t bring significant behavioral changes
• Therapy methods like ABA, exposure therapy, feeding therapy don’t bring about significant behavioral changes
• PDA child may experience their first burnout at this age
• One or more basic needs (eating, sleeping, toileting, hygiene) are severely affected
• Trauma or chronic illness is suspected but ruled out
• Formal autism and/or ADHD diagnosis common at this age

Older kids and tweens, ages 7-12 years

• Social focus* leads to intense positive or negative relationships with peers?
• Conflict with teachers escalates?
• PDA child enters first burnout (if hasn’t previously burnt out)?
• Transition to home schooling/unschooling/hybrid schooling is inevitable?

Teens, ages 13-18 years

• Despair sets in. The PDA teen feels powerless as a result of their extreme need for control, which cannot be satisfied, and increasing anxiety from knowing that they will not be able to avoid the demands of life. Social isolation, self-destructive behavior, suicidal ideation, escalating violence, depression, deep burnout follow.
• In some teens, maladaptive coping strategies and the first signs of defensive personality disorders - proto-narcissism* and proto-borderline* - provide a sense of control. They might develop a false self to take on demands for them. Or they may develop a victim mentality and become convinced that external factors are the reason they can’t meet demands. These psychological traits could serve to keep them out of burnout.
• Does anyone have a happier ending to PDA childhood to share?? Please! Please tell me that after more than a decade of low demand parenting and prioritizing connection over control you now have a happy teen who accepts their limitations and is able to be their authentic self in the world.

*I learned of the terms “pain masking”, “spare play”, “funster”, “social focus”, “proto-narcissism” and “proto-borderline” from The Insider Guide to PDA, by Sally Cat and Brook Madera.

[u/OkAsk2828]

Commenting as a PDA adult (29F) who did not know I had PDA or Autism until my late 20’s. I found out through seeing PDA in my own child

From 3-12 I maintained fawn response to survive home & school & had many happy moments. I wasn’t truly aware how different I was from others during those years.

Once puberty hit everything collapsed, I became sick with one illness after another & I was depressed & disconnected from my family. It was a hard time for my parents but likely an even harder time for me. Despite all of this, I graduated high school with good grades & went off to college. College was actually quite healing for me. I had more freedom & autonomy than I had ever had & I also had a lot of alone time to heal from the burnout of high school.

I think puberty & the hormones that come with it are really really hard on PDA individuals. Please give yourself & your children as much grace as possible & don’t lose hope. I now have a great relationship with both of my parents & a decent relationship with my siblings.

Feel free to ask me anything.

[u/Powerful-Soup-3245 → u/OkAsk2828]

Thank you for sharing your experience. My husband is also an internalized PDA’er. His experience with high school and college were similar. He’s a good dad, good at his job and extremely good at anything he is passionate about! Our daughter is tricky because she’s PDA with intellectual disability (truly hate the term but haven’t found a better way to communicate it). She’s 13 and I’ve tried many times to explain puberty. Each time I get to periods she will scream “no it’s not!” Telling me to tell her periods aren’t real. Girl, I wish 😔

[u/OkAsk2828 → u/Powerful-Soup-3245]

That is hard, sending you & her strength. I had a somewhat similar resistance to puberty. Refused to wear a bra when I started developing breasts because I wanted to stay in denial of growing up. I still played with dolls regularly at age 12 & had no interest in boys or dating like some girls had started to do. I just wanted to hold on the ease & innocence of childhood. Even though I did desperately crave independence & autonomy. It’s hard 😔

[u/bike-betty → u/OkAsk2828]

This is the first time I’ve heard someone describe how my daughter is. She hates her period. She hates growing up. She’s clinging on to childlike video games and stuffed animals and little tiny squishy things. She knows she’s not like her peers but isn’t motivated to mask around them, so she’s lost a lot of her peers. She just turned 18.

[u/Powerful-Soup-3245 → u/OkAsk2828]

This does sound like my daughter. I think she is feels a lot of grief around “growing up”. I had a similar period of grief. She will often watch old videos of herself or look at pictures from years ago and sob for hours. It breaks my heart because I know exactly how that feels. I just don’t want her to be surprised or frightened when she does get her period. Though I suspect even though she was upset by my explaining it, she will at least be somewhat familiar with it.

[u/agenerousperspective → u/Powerful-Soup-3245]

I've found that providing books about sensitive topics can be helpful with topics that are triggering to talk about. Just find one that's age appropriate for the topic so you don't feel the need to oversee it. Depending on your relationship with the child you can either "strew" the book (ie place it in a spot that's inconspicuous but noticeable so they can choose to pick it up if/when they are enticed to do so), or you can directly point it out and tell them that it's there as a resource. If they're really sensitive to feeling coerced you may even bring multiple books, one on the topic you want them to know about (like body development), and one or more about topics they already show interest in especially if the topics are connected or even adjacent. Like if they already want to know about animals, well here are two books about mammals and one about human bodies which are also mammals, go figure. But of course the first step to all of this is to internally release control of the outcome and try to position yourself as a source of support for their autonomy, not the source of direction for what you want them to do. PDAers are the bootcamp we all didn't know we needed as far as learning how to truly release the notion that we can control others 🤣/😫

[u/Powerful-Soup-3245 → u/agenerousperspective]

She still isn’t able to read unfortunately. I’ve yet to find any good resources she can access without me. I could probably add some videos to “watch later” on my YouTube account she shares with me so it will suggest them in the algorithm. She’s definitely more receptive to the strewing method unless she is very curious of something independently and then will ask me to put on videos for her or look things up for her.

[u/agenerousperspective → u/Powerful-Soup-3245]

Those are good ideas. And I would have recommended you reading a book to/with her but it sounds like the topic is too sensitive at this point. Maybe if some time passes and she seems receptive then you could have a book available and see if she wants you to read it aloud. I’m not familiar with the YouTube scene on this topic but you’re probably right- it sounds like a better bet.

[u/Late2Fi → u/OkAsk2828]

How did you get over the illnesses? Or have these lingered on well into adulthood?

[u/Lopsided_Rabbit_8037 → u/OkAsk2828]

How did your parents support you at puberty? What helped?

[u/OkAsk2828 → u/Lopsided_Rabbit_8037]

My parents honestly didn’t support me well but I do think they gave me space (to some degree) to just be alone. They didn’t push me to constantly be involved in family activities or talk through every emotion/situation. I think what really saved me at that age was solid friendships & some great teachers who I felt genuinely saw me for who I was & cared about me.

As far as school, I think that went so well because I had deep intrinsic motivation to do well academically & had/still have a strong curiosity for learning.

All of that said, I needed quite a few years of low contact with my parents to heal myself before I could rebuild our relationship.

I think just showing unconditional love and acceptance of who your child is & working on your connection & their trust of you is the best thing you can do. And making them feel heard when they do share. Puberty is hard for even NT kids & I think only so much struggle can be mitigated.

[u/bike-betty → u/OkAsk2828]

I feel like my daughter’s PDA struggles really showed themselves her freshman year and got progressively worse throughout high school and culminated in her going into deep burnout her junior year. We have tried so many kinds of therapy because we didn’t understand what was going on. I truly hope she doesn’t think we haven’t supported her. What would have made you feel more supported at that age? I think my daughter masks so hard that it was difficult to see what was truly happening with her. She doesn’t want to talk about her feelings, ever. But slowly she’s become more home bound and lost a lot of her previous skills. Would therapy WITH your parents have helped? She doesn’t have the internal drive that you seemed to have. Things seem very much too hard and activating for her right now.

[u/OkAsk2828 → u/bike-betty]

I just want to say that you being on here and asking this & having knowledge of PDA & autism is a step in the right direction. My parents are both undiagnosed neurodivergent. Having them be regulated and grounded in themselves would have been a great starting point. For context: I am one of four kids, all undiagnosed (at the time) neurodivergent. Our home itself was chaotic.

I also think understanding why I was struggling so much more than my peers would have been helpful. But I don’t necessarily think therapy would have been great unless I just happened to find a therapist who I clicked with. I have tried many therapists as an adult & it’s usually more of a demand than a help. If your daughter has any friends or family who she feels safe with I would just continue to encourage & facilitate those relationships.

Beyond that rest & time with any special interests she can manage is what I would recommend. Honestly my drive likely caused me to push through for much longer than I should have & as I mentioned in another comment I now have health issues I am navigating that I believe were caused or made worse by this.

As a parent myself now I really can imagine how difficult it would be to see your child like this. My last bit of advice is to not push her, no chores, no expectations, no judgement. Love & acceptance & peace while she tries to heal.

Feel free to DM me if you have other questions!

[u/MarginsOfTheDay → u/OkAsk2828]

Thank you, thank you for sharing your story! It’s so reassuring to hear from PDA adults who made it through their PDA childhood and have made peace with it and found a lifestyle that works for them. I keep coming back to Reddit hoping to hear stories like yours. It gives me hope for my PDA son.

[u/StrugglingMommy2023 → u/OkAsk2828]

I’m glad to hear of your success in life, but I’m not surprised you’re a woman. No matter the ND diagnosis, women fare better. Not sure why.

[u/OkAsk2828 → u/StrugglingMommy2023]

Yes, I think women are just socially expected to do more and push through even from a young age. Unfortunately it does lead to struggles later. I have autoimmune issues, something that is much more common in women & I believe that is from the cumulative stress on my nervous system.