PDA Support
Following your Family Assessment & Clinical Treatment Plan, your child will begin a personalised programme of 1:1 therapy tailored to their individual strengths, needs, and treatment goals. Parent support sessions may also be included within the clinical plan, where appropriate, to help you understand and respond to your child’s needs, develop practical strategies for use at home, and support consistency and progress beyond the therapy sessions.
Who We Work With
Our PDA support can be particularly helpful for children and young people who experience:
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A strong need for autonomy and control
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High levels of anxiety around everyday demands
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Avoidance of seemingly ordinary requests and expectations
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Distress when feeling pressured, rushed or controlled
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Meltdowns, shutdowns or emotional overwhelm
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Difficulty with transitions and unexpected changes
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Negotiating, delaying or finding creative ways to avoid demands
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School-related anxiety, avoidance or difficulties attending
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Conflict around routines such as getting dressed, homework, mealtimes or bedtime
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Difficulties when traditional rewards, consequences or behaviour strategies are used
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Intense emotions and difficulties with regulation
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Low self-esteem or feeling frequently misunderstood
What looks like defiance or challenging behaviour can sometimes be a child's response to anxiety, overwhelm and a perceived loss of control. Understanding what is happening beneath the behaviour allows us to respond very differently.
Sometimes the most effective way to support a child is to support their parents alongside them. Where appropriate, your child's individual therapy can be combined with one of our parenting programmes, helping the whole family understand what's happening and work towards positive change together. This means the skills and progress developed in therapy can be supported at home too — creating meaningful, lasting change both inside and beyond the therapy room.
Our Approach
Our approach is low-demand, collaborative and individualised. Rather than relying on compliance, rewards or consequences, we work to understand the situations that create anxiety and pressure for your child and what helps them feel safer, more regulated and able to engage.
Therapy is adapted to the young person's interests, communication style and need for autonomy. Sessions may include conversation, therapeutic games, creative activities, visual tools, emotional-regulation work and collaborative problem-solving. Choice, flexibility and trust are particularly important.
We also recognise that supporting a child with a PDA profile can place enormous pressure on parents and family life. Parent sessions can help you understand patterns of demand avoidance, reduce unnecessary conflict and explore ways of communicating, setting boundaries and approaching everyday demands more collaboratively.
Where appropriate, individual child therapy can be delivered alongside one of our parenting programmes, helping children and parents develop new ways of understanding and responding to difficulties together.
What Children & Young People Learn
Our aim isn't to teach a child to become more compliant. Instead, we help them develop greater understanding of themselves, their emotions and what happens when demands begin to feel overwhelming.
Children and young people will learn to:
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Recognise situations that trigger anxiety or a loss of control
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Understand their own responses to demands and expectations
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Identify early signs of overwhelm
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Develop strategies for emotional and nervous-system regulation
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Communicate when something feels too difficult or demanding
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Express their needs without situations escalating into conflict
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Develop greater flexibility when plans or expectations change
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Participate in collaborative problem-solving
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Understand and communicate their boundaries
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Develop confidence, self-understanding and self-acceptance
Over time, the goal is to help young people feel safer, better understood and more able to navigate everyday expectations, while helping families move away from repeated battles towards greater connection and cooperation.
Book a Free Consultation
You do not have to manage this alone. If you're ready to better understand your child's behaviour and begin creating positive change at home, book a free 15-minute consultation today.
Take the first step towards a calmer, more connected family life today. Contact our team to arrange your consultation.
