Case Studies
Found 37 listings
Helen’s story – PDA in families and deciding to home educate
Helen self-identifies with a PDA profile and sees the same traits in other family members including her daughter and her Mum, with mutual understanding across the generations having led to an instinctively collaborative and compassionate approach to both parenting and education. Passionately believing that our education system is not [...]
Surviving A-Levels – Jo’s story
Personal Reflection: Surviving A-Levels by Jo.
Jo is a PDA young adult. He studied A-Level Philosophy, Maths and English at a mainstream school and shares his personal experience here, offering valuable insights for both young people and adults. Jo reflects on some of the challenges he faced and the approaches [...]
Keira’s story
Keira is 17 and currently doing very well after a 10 year struggle with an eating disorder and difficulties related to her PDA profile not being understood or supported by health and social care. Her story illustrates the life-changing impact when professionals adapt their practice to be person-centred and [...]
Jim’s story
Jim is a 33 year old PDAer and has worked at Waitrose for 7 years. He likes to raise awareness of PDA and share his story so that parents know that things can turn out well for their child despite how challenging circumstances may be along the way. Jim [...]
Winning a Blue Peter competition – Naomi’s story
Hi, I’m Naomi (age 12), I have PDA and I recently won a Blue Peter (BP) competition!
The whole filming experience was pretty overwhelming but also gave me some amazing and life-long memories. I think PDAers find it really difficult to experience and try new things as we usually try to [...]
Beth’s story
Beth’s Dad Jeremy tells the devastating and disturbing story (trigger warning: this case study includes details of self-harm, restraint and abuse) of how Beth was ‘failed by the system’. Jeremy covers Beth’s early years, her 19 placements in 6 years, her first section aged 11 and her fateful move [...]
James’ story
James is 14 and kindly shared this extract he wrote about his experience of PDA. His insightful and honest account covers how PDA can be misunderstood; masking; school; the need to have ‘demand free’ time; the importance of trust in relationships; the impact of the Covid pandemic and what [...]
Q&A with Sage – teenage PDAer
Q&A with a PDA teenager Sage who volunteered to answer questions posed by the online PDA community on a variety of topics. Sage wants to “help people understand that there’s light at the end of the tunnel and that PDA can be managed when it’s understood properly.”
Tim’s story
Tim hadn’t heard of PDA until his youngest son was diagnosed with this profile of autism two years ago. During his son’s assessment Tim realised there were parallels with his own life. He was referred to adult mental health services by his GP where he was told that despite [...]
Agnes’ Story
During her early years at school Agnes was a model pupil - in stark contrast to the behaviour she displayed at home. Her parents and siblings struggled to understand where her outbursts of anger stemmed from. Over time Agnes’s school related anxiety increased until she began a period of [...]
Ben’s Story
Years of being misunderstood led to one failed placement after another before Ben was eventually sectioned age 29 and spent 3 years in an ATU. His first supported living placement was too unstructured with serious repercussions for Ben’s health and wellbeing. Under the Care Act 2014, Ben’s family now [...]
In Mainstream School – Rob’s Story
Adopting a PDA-friendly and holistic approach to education together with a totally individualised curriculum and a reduced timetable has been ‘transformational’ according to Rob’s head teacher. His one-to-one teacher shares his journey and some top tips for others.
PDA diagnosis & inclusive approach enable Rob to thrive in mainstream school [...]
Southgate Community Special School and Finley
As a class team we are constantly striving to improve our own practice and think of exciting and tempting ideas to engage Finley in learning activities. We have learnt so much from this journey but know we have so much more to learn too, most importantly though we have [...]
Jupiter Free School and Arijana
Arijana’s classmates have adapted with ease and were very accepting that Arijana was ‘learning how to be in school’. This is in no small part down to the strong values and culture that permeates the whole school and the recognition that good practice in SEN education is good practice [...]
Tony’s Story
Tony is 40 and lives in the U.S. He has a diagnosis of ASD with co-morbid Generalized Anxiety Disorder and Complex PTSD. He identifies strongly with PDA and has been reducing demands in his life so that he can lower his anxiety levels. His long-term goal in life is [...]
Mark’s Story
Mark ‘built masks*’ and ‘faked neuro-typical behaviour’ all his life whilst struggling under the surface with social interaction and unable to find a settled home or work life. Mark was diagnosed with autism aged 50 and self-identifies with a PDA profile. But lack of recognition of this more atypical [...]
Julia’s Story
Julia was diagnosed with PDA by Elizabeth Newson aged 12 after her increasingly challenging behaviour resulted in school exclusion and social isolation. Now in her early 30s, Julia recounts the impact PDA (and her co-morbid ADHD) has had from childhood onwards and how increased self-awareness and connecting with other [...]
Sally’s Story
Sally was diagnosed with autism in her 40s and through her own research self-identified as having a PDA profile. She felt empowered by the self-awareness that her diagnoses enabled and eloquently describes how this has helped transform her life whilst also explaining how PDA impacts her every moment. Sally [...]
Peter’s Story
Peter’s primary school years were a nightmare and his behaviour at home took a toll on his whole family. Lack of support and fighting the authorities added to the burden. Eventually his parents made the heart-breaking decision to request a residential placement for Peter. With experienced support staff who [...]
Riko’s Story
Riko was diagnosed with Asperger’s aged 27, and through her own research realised that PDA was the best fit for her profile. Looking back, Riko realises how much she masked her difficulties and found her own ways to accommodate for them, though she also experienced periods of deep depression [...]
Freddie’s Story
Freddie was diagnosed with Atypical Autism and ADHD just before his 12th birthday. His parents didn’t feel these diagnoses explained the difficulties Freddie was experiencing. PDA had been mentioned to them a few years previously and they adopted many PDA-friendly strategies to help him. Freddie’s family have seen vast [...]
John’s Story
Through her own research, John’s Mum felt he had many autistic traits but that there were boxes he didn’t fit. John struggled on with a non-specific autism diagnosis but school attendance was erratic and recommended strategies made him worse. After a lengthy battle and multiple diagnoses, John was eventually [...]
Michael’s Story
An ASD diagnosis helped Michael’s parents justify their need to parent differently, something they had previously felt blamed for. However Asperger’s didn’t fully or accurately describe his presentation, whereas PDA fits him ‘like a glove’. Michael’s Mum had found herself naturally adopting PDA-friendly strategies through her own trial and [...]
Milly’s Story
After years of increasingly challenging behaviour, an inaccurate Asperger’s diagnosis and no professional support, my family was in complete crisis. Only through my own tenacity, the support of fellow parents and consistent use of PDA strategies have we been able to see the light at the end of the [...]
Dan’s Story
Because Dan masked his difficulties at school, whilst his anxiety was sky high at home and it was a daily battle to get him to attend, it was only when he ran from school that we were taken seriously. Despite school & external agencies working hard, their efforts were [...]
Katie’s Story
Children like Katie seem too complicated for the usual system, no one knows what to do with them. This puts all the pressure on the parents. And yet my evidence and strong belief that Katie had PDA were dismissed and my parenting blamed. Advice targeting the incorrect diagnosis of [...]
James’ Story
James was a lively toddler with an inquisitive nature, though his family recognised early on that some of his behaviours weren’t typical for a boy of his age. He managed to attend school up until year 3 at which point James’ anxiety levels became very apparent, and his negative [...]
Stan’s Story
Already having another child with Asperger’s enabled Stan’s Mum to really understand the differences with PDA, both in terms of how it presents and in terms of handling strategies. Having persevered in order to obtain a diagnosis of ‘atypical autism with PDA traits’, Stan’s Mum then trained others in [...]
Joe’s Story
Joe had managed to mask at school until expectations increased in Y3 when things went rapidly downhill. An initial diagnosis of Asperger’s, dyspraxia and sensory processing disorder (SPD) was refined to PDA; Joe was also prescribed low-dose Prozac to help with his anxiety. These together with a close and [...]
Francisco’s Story
Mostly our parenting was blamed for Francisco’s difficulties, but we never stopped looking for answers and knew deep down that it wasn’t a question of being firmer or having stronger boundaries. From the point of diagnosis onwards, daily life has become much easier because we now understand what [...]