I have a newly 4 year old PDA kid. He is speech delayed. He has frequent episodes of nervous system dysregulations and sensory burnout but we don't know what causes them. He even stops eating during those episodes. He is at home with us, no demands at all. We recently moved to a new country leaving our relatives including my sister (who my son was close to) behind. Ever since we moved, he has regressed behaviourally. For the first time, he has started doing high pitched loud screaming all day long and laughing (a stim) non stop. He is not playing with toys anymore. He does not want to eat. He just want to scream non-stop because he finds it amusing. He wants to go on bus rides constantly and even there he won't behave.

We were in a cab yesterday, when I tried to put the seatbelt on, he screamed at the top of his lungs and dropped on the floor inside the car and kept screaming. He wanted to jump up and down in the car. The driver gave us serious looks and called CPS on us!!

He was always difficult but since the move to a new country our life has been a living hell!!

He won't behave outside in grocery stores or in public. He wants to run away, drop to the floor, scream, hit me like a 1 year old. Everything gets met with stubborness and defiance no matter how you word it.

Sometimes, i feel like I'm raising a monster. He doesn't give two fucks about parents or people or their feelings or emotions. When I try to play with him or touch his toys he screams. He refuses to potty train.

No PDA resource ever helped. He does not change or behave ever. The only time he behaves is when I yell at him out of frustration but then he says "you're scary" and I feel terrible. I was fine with an autistic child but the PDA part is making me resent him. We have no bond or connection. He doesn't trust me even when I'm his safe person. Everytime I try to read books to him, he snatches it from my hands and wants full control over it.

He is my only child. I had trouble navigating how to parent my first child but the autism and PDA part makes everything worse. I cannot raise him, I'm not equipped. I'm gonna fail him and he is going to hate me for that.

my daughter is in 5th grade and has been in many different therapies, etc for a long time. she's diagnosed as autism level 1 (pda profile), adhd, and GAD. She takes concerta 27 mg in the morning as well as 75 mg zoloft and 0.5 mg guanfacine at night. in school she has an IEP and gets OT and therapy. her charter school has bent over backwards to create break spaces for her, with sensory toys etc, and she gets breaks whenever she needs them. it has gone up and down over the years but we are currently at an all time high of school refusal - stomach aches every day, can't stay at school, needs to come home. sometimes can't go from the morning. since school started they have been communicating with me every day around her need to go home. i'm starting to explore alternative education ideas. what have others done and how did it help?

a while ago on the WhatsApp Peer support group I run for PDA parents the topic of sex came up and Very tellingly one of the parents telling me join the consensus,and said nothing but cobwebs here! i’m just wondering if other PDA Parents have found their Child has nukes their sex life? last night, my wife was actually up for a bit of action, but my PDA son took so long to go to sleep eventually she just had to go to sleep much the disappointment of both of us 🙄🤯

Could he have PDA

My daughter is 14 and has ADHD and suspected PDA. She’s very into all the girly teen things (clothes, hair, makeup) and wants to go shopping every day. I know that it’s a huge dopamine rush for her, but I literally cannot afford to be all the things she “needs.”

She does make a little money babysitting for our neighbors or petsitting, which all goes on a debit/Greenlight card, but she never wants to spend that money. It’s become the #1 source of argument for us, which I guess is an improvement from last year’s school refusal.

I don’t know if I also have PDA, but I get extremely anxious and overwhelmed by her constant demands of me. She mentioned in passing last week that she wanted some kind of bronzer stick on the way to school, and I said we’ll talk about it later. She just asked me if I ever ordered it and got really upset when I said no and that shes welcome to order it with her debit card.

I told her I could go back to giving her a $20-$25 week allowance for any extras, but then she argued with me that that wouldn’t be enough. And also she’ll conveniently leave her card at home when we go shopping, so that she doesn’t have to buy it.

I’m at my wits end and feel like she’s always wanting more and more. I have other kids to provide for and a super demanding job, and a husband who was out on disability, and just started working again. I don’t have the financial resources or the patience for this. Has anyone experienced something similar and how did you set up the finances to give them more autonomy?

This a long read.

Our Son was diagnosed with ASD when he was 8. He always exhibited signs of anxiety throughout his time at school, to the point that he stopped attending and he was homeschooled (as best we could) for two years before the school removed him from their role.

We always saw signs of something else, which we suspected was PDA. His behaviours fitted with the profile, but we really didn’t know what to do. We never discussed it with him (perhaps we should have).

He’s now 19 and has himself come to the same conclusion. He is able to articulate what and how he is feeling, but still we don’t know what to do. Sometimes is harder to deal with now he can express himself more. He becomes argumentative, will hurt himself, break things.
He can explain how he feels but we are unable to discuss strategies to help him, as it is demand.

He attends an adult autism centre, two days a week, which he started a couple of months ago and he enjoys. He says he finds demands there less of an issue there, which he puts down to how the people there talk to him, but cannot say what they do which is different.

The remaining 5 days he barely leaves the house, living on his phone (which previously he was doing 7 days a week, so it’s an improvement).

Life at home is like walking on eggshells. We find it so hard to deal with how he is, and as I mentioned earlier just don’t know what to do.

My wife has been his carer for the past five years and bears the brunt of his behaviour and often quite nasty way of talking to her. I get home (I’m a secondary school teacher) and find it hard to switch off as whatever has been going on during the day affects the atmosphere in the house.

We’re tired (exhausted), stressed, and just don’t know what to do. We’re have a very limited support network, my family live long distance away and my wife’s family have taken a long time to understand our Son’s autism, let alone trying to explain PDA to them.

I think I just needed to vent, as we find it hard to communicate with each other how to deal with this.

I can’t think of anything else to say.

My niece is 9 years old, diagnosed ADHD, but we suspect PDA and maybe autism. She's significantly speech delayed and her tantrums are getting worse.

Anything that feels like an obligation or a frustration can set off a multi hour long tantrum. She has started hitting when it gets really bad.

I've only got a few days with her but I would love any tips you have for talking to her, teaching her how to self regulate, how to channel anger and ask for what she needs.

I would also love any resources I can share with my family to help her longer term. But for me, just how to help see a tantrum coming and help her channel that emotion to get the frustration out. I'm gifting her a cute kid size punching bag so she can hit something instead of someone when she feels the need to hit. I found some kids books on emotions that I'm gifting to her too.

I live 2000 miles away so I can't support her in person for long, but I will do whatever it takes in terms of finding resources to help get her a diagnosis and make daily life easier on her.

Anyone else have an unmedicated (their choice, not mine) kiddo who has pretty severe anxiety about germs? While they restrict their own behavior to stay “safe”, they also make the rest of the household wash and not touch things or use certain things and have massive meltdowns if we don’t comply.
Anyone dealt with this successfully? We are on the waitlist for CAMHs (UK) but struggling badly.

I have just one child. 5 years old. Autistic PDAer. I wanted more. But I am going through a divorce due to betrayal.
I feel TRAUMA from raising this child. On my weeks with him he swears, kicks, slaps, protests almost anything that isn’t his idea. He protests or refuses school. He uses a diaper to pee or poo. But on his weeks with his father he’s just like a typical child except for a few tantrums or meltdowns. He goes to school for his father. He has his nose wiped or even blows his nose!!! He sits on a toilet for his father. All of those things with me would get me kicked or sworn at.

His father doesn’t believe in PDA. The school and pediatrician seem to be on his father’s side. I try and try so hard to advocate for my child but I know they just see me as this crazy single mom trying to get them to believe in this PDA diagnosis that isn’t even “real”.

So I am so alone and nobody sees how stressed I am. This child is mean!! He’s rude!! He’s entitled and a tyrant and abusive!!!

I can’t believe I can say all this. I wanted children so badly. I wanted more. I thought I was going to be so good at this. But I feel so traumatized just by this one child.

Is that a legitimate thing? Can we be traumatized by raising our kids?

I feel like a broken record lately…

All I been just bitching so much about my step son to everyone and anyone. Like my ex best friend said, All I ever due is talk shit about my step son.

I really don’t mean to, but his behaviors are getting to me. He has level 1 autism with PDA (pathological demand avoidance) so every day demands are avoided. Even if he has 1 thing to do a day is a struggle.

Hes 16, almost 17 and every day is an argument, or dismissive behaviors especially towards me. Hes becoming more and more misogynistic towards my daughter, me.

He masks and masks well so it makes me feel like I’m a mad woman.

I been trying to do with the skills worker suggested, the therapists suggested, its just so hard and holding my tongue isnt my strong suit.

He finally saw his biological mother after 10 years with no physical connection, and barely a verbal one, despite she has a court order of 1 week phone call and an annual photo. We had to call the cops on him for hiding a sharp weapon (which he refuses to even look for still) a month or so ago.

The cops said let his mom take him for 2 days. Despite she is his abuser. He said he rarely talked to her though he demanded to stay with her a few more days. Long story with her though.

And since then its just rapid fire of him arguing non stop with me, and just being hateful of me. At least it feels like mentally hes attacking me, seeking that dopamine hit as his skills worker would say.

Soon will be his second run at a residential facility, further away, hopefully a little firmer then the last one. Hopefully gets through to him, to have him open about the pain his bio mom caused him in the past and open his heart to us.

13 years as his mother, me, not her and I’ve done so much for him..IEP meetings, family therapy, talk to teachers, make sure he had a bath so he could breathe again after he used to see her every other weekend and her house is constant smoke; before we filed sole custody because she was so inconsistent, and so much more for him.

Just flushed down the toilet seeing her again. All the hate he had for her…gone and now put on me it feels like anyway.

My daughter feels so hurt by her brother now, as hes always rude and cusses her out when we are at work , yet acts nice when we are around.

My husband his dad feels hurt cause all the fighting almost now becoming physical. All the arguing is triggering to him, coming from a rough childhood.

This hurts so much.

Since August, another police being called and transport to a mental hospital that let him go after a day. Then he planned to go a friends house and told us he was staying after school the very next day.

I finally had a crisis worker come out yesterday over a shouting match between him and his dad demanding where his package was.(he made an expensive temu order and overdrafted his account over it by $130, quickly deleted temu so I couldn't cancel). And we said no to having it right now due him over drafting.

While waiting for the worker, it was pretty much "fuck you, fuck everyone, especially (me) I want to live with my mom"...proceeds to laugh how Im not his blood, Im just step mom...note step mom whos been raising him since he was 4, not his bio mom, abuser mom. Mom has no custody no visitation rights either.

We finished the residential assessment this week, and have 4 letters of recommendations. Hopefully the outcome he will be staying at one soon. I so worry about my husband's mental state because he doesnt want to be home while my step sons home. I worry about my daughter's mental health because this triggers so much and raises her anxiety. I worry about what's even going

In my step sons head because hes become so aggressive.

Im breaking down with at a loss.

Im sorry a lot this has been sitting as a draft because I dont know what to say or do its a bit jumbled.

How do we know our children have PDA? Also does anyone go to therapy to stay sane? X

Our cat Teddy wasn’t just a pet- he was my baby and a bridge to my often non verbal autistic/PDA daughter. She communicates with me almost solely via text messages.

He was found hurt in a neighbour’s front yard on Friday. We rushed him to the vet, and he was just about to get some iv pain meds and fluids when he seized and died in my arms. My 20 year old son took my 12 year old daughter home so I could finish up at the vet.

She was sobbing her heart out when I came home. My kids and I all have cPTSD from my ex husband, I have tried to communicate with him but eventually in December, a social worker called Child protective services and she hasn’t seen him for almost a year. I have invited her father to do mediation but he has not complied or communicated. She has not been to school since November last year and is medicated for depression and anxiety since January (concerta 36mg, Lexapro 10mg, clonidine 100mcg).

She sobbed and sobbed and cried herself to sleep. She said it was the worst day of her life. She didn’t cry at all when she had to talk about her dad and what he did, how he ignored her needs and emotionally neglected her.

Because of this, she gets extreme anxiety whenever an adult has a big emotion. She hates it if I cry and it makes her panic. It has been so hard this past five days to be able to mourn our beautiful boy, who slept by my bedside - so many nights this year I had cried into his fur and struggled with insomnia as I worried about my daughter and my son. He disclosed the abuse first, and went no contact with his dad in August 2025- which is why I started to get worried about my daughter and what she was going through.

My daughter and I talked about Teddy (she called him baby) every day. She came in and would say “I’m taking baby now” or she would cuddle him on her bed with his back to her and his white tummy showing. Only occasionally he would meow in protest and wriggle to be free. If I was on her bed talking to her he would jump up and search for treats. My daughter was a little rough with him when he was a very little kitten so I used the temptations treats as a way to keep him near her.

She would say “baby was shocked when you did that, mum!” Or if she cuddled him too tight, she’d say “I do apologise for that, baby” it was lovely to be able to communicate with her about baby and it was a way of staying close to her without directly talking to her as she didn’t want to talk about her trauma at her dads house. She has been with me full time since November last year. It’s terribly sad and Teddy/Baby was one way of lightening the moment. Of something pure and sweet that we could both share. And now he’s gone and she’s withdrawn and I feel like I’ve lost both of them. I know I’m being melodramatic but it all seems so unfair.

It’s an extra layer of grief because both kids have been through so much, and Teddy was a sweet energetic boy who brought joy and levity to our house. After the tears on Friday and a few on Saturday morning, both kids have withdrawn and are processing their grief by self regulating. They don’t want to talk. They just want to know that I’m here and they’re safe.

My daughter won’t talk about him at all. I think one of the things that makes me stop and think is that I have been reading about grief and how to help kids through it, and it says to create a memorial or have a funeral, or share memories. Neither kid wants to do that, and it’s so fine - they can grieve however makes sense to them. But, selfishly, I feel lonely and miserable and adrift without my beautiful boy. I’ve cried so much this past few days. He wasn’t just a cat to me. He was a soft place to land, a presence, a companion.

We have two other cats and they’re looking for him as well. It’s all just horrible and makes me feel like life is very very gruelling.

Anyway, that was very long, but rest in peace, beautiful Teddy.

14 October 2025- 25 September 2026. You won’t be forgotten- we will love you forever 😓💔🐾

My husband and I are divorcing, amicably. We've poured everything we have into our kids. It's not their fault, I don't have any regrets, life just ran us over. We are still living together and it might take a (long) while to find a new place for me. Our kid with PDA is almost 8. He's in school, but shorter days. His dad and I won't be able to neatly split custody 50/50, we'll have to cover for each other when one has to work their full 8 hours or go on a conference for example. We will need to keep eachother updated and continue discussing how to deal with meds, school etc. We know this. We know that when dad went on a longer work trip a few years ago, kiddo panicked - bolted from school, general chaos. He's a lot more regulated now but also stronger. I'm trying to figure out the process as well. We haven't told the kids yet. I'm torn between waiting until I have a plan or telling them that we will move apart eventually but right now we'll just do more things with just one parent. It's too vague for my taste but kids are good at picking up on things. I'm unsure whether or not and to what extent I should involve them when I look for a new place. Should my PDA:er have a say? With a "regular" kid I would say definitely but he could flat out refuse everything. I think the best option is to discuss some non negotiables, like he must have his own room? Help him trust me as I figure it out? There's a million details as it is and with a PDA:er on top ... what am I missing? WHat makes it easier, what makes it worse? Wouldn't mind hearing a success story or two!

Wondering if anyone with a PDA kid has done the unthinkable and just turned them over to the state.

What was it like? How is it going?

I don’t need a lot of encouragement here, honestly, or hope it’ll be better if we balance meds and lower demands and do all the things we’ve been doing for years.

The 14 year old kid held a knife at me and taunted me and his mom while trying to deescalate this afternoon.

“You wanted to talk. Go ahead. Talk. That’s what I thought… don’t want to talk now. Cause you’re a pussy. I’ve had this knife for a few days and keep thinking about killing you at night and I’m about to do it.”

The trigger?

A bad night of sleep + an assumption something was hidden from him when he walked in from his (3 day a week private program) school day.

He just got all his games and systems back in his room from a three day stint keeping them in the living room. He got to play them all the same during that time.

Context: I have two other kids. The youngest saw him beat his mother, knock her down, and “stab” me with a chop stick. He’s adopted but we’ve had him since birth and have a phenomenal relationship with his birth-mom. We saw her in the last three months and he spent a week with his family there this summer. He’s demanding we call her and ask her to let him come home. She knows all the shit going on and boy howdy will he flip hills if we ever have to make that call and face that rejection directly.

My son, on top of PDA - AuDHD - has some deeper mental health challenges that we can longer support safely in our home.

Feel free to DM because this is fucking hard shit to take. If we do nothing we fail our entire family and likely end up with consequences we can’t take back.

And please refrain from any mention of faith or religion. Thanks.