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Mending Memories for PDA Families

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Mending Memories for PDA Families

Linda is an Accredited Mental Health Social Worker, EMDR therapist and PDA parent. Linda offers Parent Coaching and EMDR Therapy.

Linda is the face behind Mending Memories for PDA Families and on a mission to support parents of PDA kids & teens. "With the right type of support I believe every person has the ability to achieve change. Feeling connected to others enables better decision making, creates higher self-esteem, improves self-confidence and it generates a sense of belonging. Healthy relationships are important for al

l people throughout their lifespan and are at the base of everything people need in order to live a meaningful life. That is why I continuously encourage clients to build healthy relationships within their network. It is also why I offer a genuine and caring approach which sets the foundation of my social work practice. I strive to provide a therapeutic environment in which people feel safe in order to build the rapport that is needed to help people to grow."

Linda is an Accredited Mental Health Social Worker who has been working in the Social Work field since 2006. She is originally from the Netherlands and has been living and working in Australia for the past 9 years. Linda has recently become a mother of a living child which has further enhanced her understanding of the joys and stresses of parenthood. Linda has extensive experience in the community working with families, parents, teenagers and children and with individuals in the fields of Community Mental Health, Domestic Violence and Child Protection. Linda is especially interested in trauma and attachment and enjoys working with parents on improving parent-child relationships, parenting skills and behaviour management. Linda received intensive training in Dyadic Developmental Psychotherapy which is a form of attachment focussed family therapy and she is an experienced Circle of Security Parenting facilitator. Other areas of special interest are depression, anxiety, stress management, self-esteem, grief and loss including infertility & pregnancy loss, PTSD, complex trauma & sensory sensitivity issues such as ADHD & high sensitivity. In sessions Linda 's main focus is EMDR therapy (which can be used with all types of difficulties) but she also draws from a range of skills such as general counselling, solution focused counselling, Cognitive Behaviour Therapy etc. Linda integrates trauma-informed and DV-informed practice models within her daily work to ensure a safe therapeutic environment for everyone. Linda is passionate about helping people heal their hearts, rather than helping them manage their pain. EMDR therapy is perfect for healing. If you are interested to know more, please visit www.mendingmemories.com.au or shoot Linda a PM!

25/08/2026

Last weekend we went on a special weekend outing.

A place with puzzle rooms. One of the rooms had a giant ball pit.

My kids were so excited the night before.

And then the morning came.

Getting dressed was hard.
Everything was silly.
Avoiding. Running around.
Their fuse were getting shorter and shorter.

From the outside, it would have been easy to think:

But you WANT to go.
You were excited about this.
Why are you making it so difficult to get out the door?

But excitement wasn't the problem.

The picture was.

They knew one piece:

We like ball pits.

But there were still so many missing pieces.

Are there going to be other kids there?
Will I have to share the space with them?
Can I take my shoes off?
Can I actually jump into the ball pit?
What are these "puzzle rooms" going to be like?
What will I have to do?
How long are we staying?
Can I decide when I'm done?
What if I get overwhelmed?

They werent necessarily consciously running through that neat little list in their heads.

But their brains were trying to work out what they were about to walk into.

And this is something I see again and again in PDA.

Before we can participate in something, we are constantly trying to build a picture of it.

What is going to happen?
What will be expected of me?
What choices will I have?
What might other people do?
What happens if something goes differently than I expect?
And can I cope with the possibilities I can't predict?

But here's the thing I think we sometimes miss:

The picture isn't just about the place we're going.

It also includes the picture a child has of themselves within that situation.

For.example:
Kids don't usually like me.
I won't know what to do.
What if I get overwhelmed?
I won't be able to cope.
Adults won't understand me.
I won't be able to get out.
The world is unpredictable and unsafe.

These beliefs don't have to be conscious thoughts.

They can simply be expectations built from previous experiences.

And often there aren't just missing pieces in the picture of the environment.

There are missing pieces in the picture of "me in this situation."

What will I do?
Who will help me?
What choices will I have?
What happens if it goes wrong?
So I believe that I can handle it?

When too many pieces are missing, even something we genuinely want to do can become incredibly difficult to move towards.

And that difficulty doesn't always look like uncertainty.

It can look like avoidance.

Silliness.

Running away.

Suddenly needing to do seventeen other things.

Irritability.

Trying to control tiny details.

Refusing to get dressed.

A very short fuse.

And if we keep pushing for participation while the picture is still too unclear or not full enough, eventually it can look like a meltdown or an aggressive outburst.

This is Sense-Making Bottleneck #1: Unclear Pictures from my developing Sense-Making lens.

That morning, instead of focusing only on getting them ready, I started helping them gather the pieces.

I asked:

"What do you expect might happen when we get there?"

And then we worked from their picture.

We looked at the venue online.

I answered the questions I could answer.

We talked through what the rooms might be like, who would be there and what the games involved.

We talked about the unknowns too.

🧡 What if there were other children?

We're there to help.

🧡 What if it became too much?

They could take a break.

🧡 What if he wanted to leave?

We had an exit plan.

And then I backed off.

Less pressure. Food. Time to process. Minecraft in the car.

Not because those things magically made the demand disappear.

But because taking in new information and rebuilding your picture takes capacity too.

And importantly, we weren't just trying to give them more information about the venue.

We were gently adding pieces to the picture of them:

I can ask questions.
I can take a break.
Mum and Dad will help me.
I don't have to know everything beforehand.
Things might be different from what I expected — and I can still work out what to do.

Because the goal isn't to create a picture where nothing difficult ever happens.

It's to gradually build a picture where:

"Even if something unexpected happens, I have ways to handle it."

And we went.

They walked into that ball pit.

And had an absolutely brilliant time.

🧩

Please see the comments for a little infographic about bottleneck nr 1 that you can share with others, or as a reminder for yourself.

Next: what happens when they DO build a picture… but become so attached to that picture that it becomes difficult for reality to deviate from it?

That's Bottleneck #2. 🧡

24/08/2026

About sense-making bottle neck nr. 5...

Sometimes your PDA brain has plenty of capacity.

The problem is that you're being asked to spend it on something that feels profoundly… meh.

Me today: I have to do my taxes.

My brain: But we could be developing the PDA sense-making framework right now.

Me: We could.

My brain: So why aren't we?

Me: I have to do my taxes TODAY, otherwise I get fined. I have been avoiding this for so long already!

My brain: This is exactly what Bottleneck nr 5 is about!

Me: I know!

My brain: We should do a quick post on it! This is way more interesting and meaningful than doing my taxes!

Me: Yes, it is!

🧡 Making the post 🧡

My brain: that was fun!

Me: I did just lose 30 minutes making this post though… and I have a client counting on me for support too. So after posting this, I really should get back to it.

My brain: Yes! My client is important, and that's super meaningful! We should get into that now!!

Me: Yes, let's kick some ass!

Also me: Ow wait, I still have to do my taxes first....

My brain: I was not designed for this! There is nothing here worth processing. 😐

My body: I can't do it! 😭

More on Bottleneck nr 5 - low personal relevance - coming soon.

PS. Please send help!

20/08/2026

After I learned about PDA I changed my parenting approach. It was working and I kept thinking:

There must be a reason why giving my son autonomy and equality had been so helpful over the past year.

We could see the difference.

When he had more autonomy…
When his perspective was treated as equal…
When we stopped trying to make him comply and instead gave him space to participate…

Things became easier.

But I kept thinking:

Surely autonomy and equality can't be the whole story.

What are they actually doing?
Why do they help?
What's happening underneath the behaviour?

And that led me back to sense-making.

By sense-making, I simply mean how we work out what's going on.

We're constantly taking in information—from our bodies, our senses, other people, our experiences, and what's happening around us—and putting it together to form a picture of what is happening.

We don't necessarily do this consciously. Our brains are doing it all the time.

And that picture helps us work out what happens next and what we can do.

I'm beginning to think that autonomy and equality are important because they help us stay involved in that process.

And when that process gets disrupted, participation can become really difficult.

I've been identifying five points where this process may become particularly difficult for people with a PDA profile.

I'm calling them:

The 5 Sense-Making Bottlenecks for PDAers

Over the next few weeks, I'll unpack each one.

Because perhaps what we call “demand avoidance” is sometimes what we see after the sense-making process has already become stuck.

Please know that I'm not suggesting that current understandings of PDA are wrong. The demand-avoidance and autonomy perspectives have helped many people make sense of their experiences.

But what if some things can also be explained through a different lens?

What if changing the question changes what we see?

And what if changing what we see changes how we support our kids?

What I'm exploring is whether sense-making can give us another layer of understanding—one that helps explain what may be happening underneath.

This is a developing theory, and I'm sharing it as something I'm exploring, testing and learning from—not as a finished explanation.

I just really want to help other parents, because no one deserves to struggle so much as we have since we became parents.

I would love to hear thoughts and experiences. Always open for feedback on the things I bring here.

With love 🧡
Linda

18/08/2026

This is me with my daughter at breakfast.

When we woke up, she told me: "I’m hungry."

Me: We can go eat something?
Her: I don’t want to.
Me: How does Weet-Bix with strawberries sound?
Her: yes!

She loves strawberries, so she happily sat down and ate them.
But when the strawberries were gone, she stopped eating.

Then she said: "I want Mummy!"
I had to sit right next to her. So I did.

And then she said: Don’t talk.
So I didn’t. I stayed right there beside her.

And then I started helping her with the Weet-Bix. I put some on the spoon and offered it to her. She ate a few bites. Then she started taking some bites herself.

And I started thinking about what was actually happening here.

She wasn’t asking me to regulate a big emotion.
She wasn’t asking me to entertain her.
She wasn’t even asking me to talk to her.

She wanted me close.

And this is something we see in PDA children all the time.

They stay close to us at home.
They follow us around.
They want us to sit with them.
They want us to play with them.

And we can easily think: "Why can’t you just do this yourself?"

But perhaps something else is happening.

Perhaps they are still making sense of what is happening, even in the safety of their own home.

Because being at home doesn't mean that everything is already understood.

Our homes are constantly changing.

People move around.
Plans change.
Siblings do unexpected things.
Someone's mood changes.
Something doesn't work the way they expected.

And our children also bring the outside world home with them.

Things that happened at school.
Something a friend said or did.
Something they saw or heard.
Something they watched on TV that they weren't sure about.
Something they dreamed about during the night.

They may keep thinking about these things long after they happen. Especially if their current picture misses information.

I have also noticed that some of the things they're trying to make sense of are huge.

My children constantly bring me questions and ideas that seem incredibly complex for their little brains.

My daughter has dreams about death and losing her parents, and she tells me about them in incredible detail (she is 3!).

Lately, Tom has been asking whether villains have mums. It turns out, he's been worrying that perhaps he is a villain because sometimes he hurts people when he's in a fight response (he's 5!).

These aren't necessarily things that are happening right now.

But they're part of the picture they're trying to build.

And I think we sometimes underestimate just how much sense-making can be happening inside a child's head & body.

A child can be sitting safely at home, apparently doing nothing, while internally trying to work out something enormous:

What does this mean?
Why did that happen?
Could this happen to me?
What does this say about me?
What happens next?
Is this person safe?
Am I safe?
What if...?

And for a child who processes a lot of information, notices subtle changes, has difficulty filling in implicit information, or has a particularly strong need to understand why things happen, there may simply be far more ongoing sense-making happening than we can see from the outside—not just in their thoughts, but through their body, their senses, their emotions and their interactions with other people.

We might experience home as predictable because we already have a picture of how our home works.

But our children are still building and updating theirs.

And perhaps this is why some PDA children continue to need us close even as they get older.

They may be perfectly capable of playing, learning, eating, building or using technology independently.

Independence in an activity doesn't necessarily mean independence in sense-making.

This is what makes me think that when a PDA child is constantly following us around the house, we might be looking at something much more complex than "clinginess."

Maybe they are still making sense of their world.

And I believe we are part of how they do that. Our presence enables them to do this.

In my next post I will go more into what our presence provides our kids.

But this is part of what I call co-sense-making. 🧡

15/08/2026

What if your PDA child is right?

I don't mean that everything your child believes is objectively correct.

I mean something different.

Their picture is THEIR truth.

It is the understanding they have built from the information available to them.

And they are going to react based on that understanding.

That doesn't mean their picture can't be incomplete.
It doesn't mean they can't have misunderstood something.
It doesn't mean we can't help them develop a different understanding.

But before we can help them update their picture, we need to understand the picture they're acting from.

I saw this so clearly with Tom at soccer yesterday.

The children were all playing with orange balls that looked exactly the same.

At one point Tom said to the coach: "Someone took my ball."
He looked really sad.

The coach replied: "That's OK. They're all the same."

But they weren't all the same to Tom.

Later, the coach put all the balls in the middle and told the children that, on his signal, they had to find a ball and kick it.

Tom carefully chose a ball. He had checked it. He noticed that this particular ball didn't have any stitches sticking out.

That was important to him. So he stayed close to that ball and kept his focus on it.

Then another child picked it up. Tom ran over and shouted: "That's my ball!"

And he pulled it out of the other child's hands. The other boy cried.

Tom's behaviour wasn't okay.

But when I understood his picture, the behaviour suddenly made sense.

In Tom's picture: Not all the balls are the same. And that particular ball was his.

In the other children's picture: The coach said to find a ball. Any ball.

Two completely different pictures.

And this is where I think we can get into trouble when we focus only on the behaviour and reactions.

Our picture says: "He took another child's ball. This is not OK".

But we need to understand: What did he believe was happening?

Because behaviour is the child's reaction of the picture they are working from.

And then something amazing happened.

I explained to the coach why that particular ball was important to Tom.

The coach didn't argue with him. He didn't tell him that his understanding was wrong.

Instead, he offered Tom a blue ball.

Tom loved that idea.

Then the coach explained to all the children: "The blue ball is Tom's ball."

And the other children honoured that.

The coach had created a shared picture. Now everyone understood the same thing. Tom knew which ball was his. The other children knew which ball was Tom's.

And the coach had created a situation where everyone could participate without needing to fight over whose understanding was right.

This is why I think trusting a PDA child's experience is so important.

Trusting their picture doesn't mean believing that their picture contains all the information.

It means recognising that their picture is the reality they are currently acting from.

If we want to help them understand something differently, we first need to understand what they currently understand.

We can then add information.
We can clarify.
We can offer another perspective.
We can change something in the environment.
And often, we can help create a shared picture that makes participation possible for everyone.

Because as a PDA parent the goal isn't: "How do I convince my child that my picture is right?"

It's: "How can we understand each other's pictures well enough to build something that makes sense together?"

And I think that is particularly important for PDA children.

Because when we dismiss their picture, that is what sets of their threat response. They won't be able to listen and see your picture.

And we may be taking away their opportunity to participate in the process of making sense of what is happening. 🧡

13/08/2026

I have some very exciting news to share! (hence the dance video 😉) 🥹🧡

My abstract has been accepted, and I have been invited to present on PDA at the National Social Work Congress in the Gold Coast (Australia)!

Which means I get to stand in front of a room full of social workers and talk about something I care deeply about:

PDA.

But I don't want this presentation to only be about what I think social workers need to know.

I want to bring your voices into that room with me.

Because many social workers may never have heard of PDA.

They may not understand why a child can look capable but still struggle enormously with participation.

They may interpret avoidance as oppositional behaviour.

They may see a parent staying beside their child and wonder why they aren't encouraging more independence.

They may not understand why autonomy, equality, trust and the way we communicate can make such a profound difference.

They may not understand that it's not that the parenting strategies that are the problem, but the way families are supported.

They may not understand that it's not the parent's fault.

So I want to ask you:

What do you wish social workers understood about PDA?

What have you experienced?

What do you wish someone had understood about your child?

What do you wish professionals would stop assuming?

What would you want me to say if you could stand beside me in that room?

Tell me in the comments.

I want to take your voices with me. 🧡

12/08/2026

Have you ever thought about what support you are actually giving your child? And why they seem so stuck to you all the time?

You know you are regulating their nervous system.
People might call this co-regulation.

But I actually think you are doing more than that!

Co-regulation is being with them whilst they are feeling big emotions, so they can share some of that weight with someone else, so it becomes less overwhelming.

You can sit with them in their feelings. When you show empathy and communicate: "I'm here. I see you're feeling scared. You are not alone".

This is helpful, but for our kids I have always felt they needed more than that. It's not just helping them with their emotions.

I wish it was that easy!

No.

I believe that a lot of PDA kids stay close because they are still making sense of what is happening around them.

Think about what a child has to make sense of when they go somewhere;

Who are these people?
What are they doing?
How are they feeling?
Do they like me?
What am I supposed to do?
What are the rules?
What happens next?
Why did that child do that?
Did the adult mean that?
What happens if I do this?
What if something changes?

And here is what you might say:

"That's the coach."
"He wants everyone to stand over here."
"I think she was telling you that it's your turn."
"That child is running over there because they're playing a different game."
"I'm not sure what the coach meant either. Let's ask."

You're providing information, clarifying what is happening, helping them understand other people's actions and sometimes simply helping them work things out.

You are helping them make sense of a situation.

And sometimes you ARE the only thing that makes sense.

This is what I call co-sense-making.

And I believe this is what you've been doing all along!

What if this is why your PDA child needs to keep you close at outings?

Maybe what looks like "clinginess" is actually something quite different.

Maybe they're still building their picture. Or maybe they need to keep you close in case their picture suddenly changes.

Because each time someone or something interrupts their picture, they can become overwhelmed. And you may be the person they trust most to help them make sense again.

That's what you've been doing. You are not just co-regulating, you are co-sense-making.

And your child is lucky to have you 🧡

09/08/2026

We know our children need to experience things in order to learn.

But..

What if they avoid the very experiences they need?

We know autonomy is important.

But..

What do we do when our child isn't yet able to do something independently?

We know we shouldn't force.

But..

How do we support participation without turning our support into another demand?

We know our children need information.

But..

What if explaining more doesn't make them feel safer — it actually makes things harder?

We know preparation can help.

But..

What if preparing them becomes overwhelming — or creates an expectation they now feel they have to meet?

We know we need to respect their "no."

But..

What happens when saying no means they miss out on the experiences that could help them build that much needed confidence and understanding?

For a long time, parenting felt like an impossible task with our two.

It felt like every decision we made had significant consequences.

If we pushed, things could fall apart.

If we stepped back, things could fall apart in a different way.

I felt like I had to keep adjusting myself, our expectations and our lives to give my children what they needed.

And honestly, at times, it felt like I had to lose myself completely in order to be the parent they needed.

I took my son out of school.

I decided that giving my children autonomy was the most important thing.

And at the time, it felt like the right decision.
It was the right decision for where we were at.

But then he recovered.
And he didn't want to go back.

And suddenly, giving him autonomy had a significant cost for me. It meant stepping away from my career.

And I found myself wondering:
Is this really what PDA parenting is supposed to look like?

Am I supposed to keep giving up more and more of myself because my child's needs always have to come first?

Because if every solution creates another significant cost somewhere else, how is this sustainable?

This is what I mean when I say PDA parenting is full of dilemmas.

The strategies we are given often make sense individually.

But when you actually live with a PDA child, you often find yourself caught between two needs that both matter.

And in our home, the PDA parenting strategies we've been using have often meant that solving one problem creates another.

I had enough of that life, so I went to find a new perspective.

And now I'm getting ready to share what I've found.

I'm putting together an introductory webinar/masterclass about this new perspective on PDA parenting — a different way of understanding what might be happening underneath these dilemmas.

If you're feeling like you've had enough of constantly solving one problem by creating another, follow along.

I think this conversation might be for you.

06/08/2026

Before I had kids, I only knew one way of parenting.

When a child wanted something, the adult decided.

"Can I watch TV?"

"No, we're about to leave. Go and play with your cars."

I saw it work for lots of families.

It didn't work for mine.

Over the years, I learned about PDA, autism, ADHD, equality and autonomy. But I still found myself wondering...

What does equality actually do and what does it look like in everyday life?

I couldn't find an answer anywhere, so I started experimenting with different approaches.

I've come to see equality differently.

I think equality creates the conditions for children to organise their own sense-making.

Instead of thinking for my children about what is good for them, I think with them.

I become curious about their thinking.

I help organise their sense-making by making information visible, asking questions and clarifying ideas, so they can develop their own understanding and decide how they want to participate.

I don't see myself as the decision-maker anymore.

I see myself as a thinking partner.

A bit like a soundboard. Someone who supports their thinking as they make sense of the world, without taking over their thinking.

These screen-time cards are one example of what it looks like in our home.

Each card represents a set amount of time on a device.

They're not really about limiting screen time.
They're about making the process visible.

My son can see how many cards he has.
He decides when to use them.
And hands them in himself.

Instead of me constantly directing what happens next, we're organising the process together.

I honestly didn't think this would work for my PDA son. I assumed he would still fight for autonomy. But he didn't.

Perhaps autonomy wasn't what he had been fighting for all along.

Perhaps he had been fighting for enough "regie" to organise his own participation (see my post about regie for more information about this term).

I no longer think my son needs me to step back.

I think he needs me to step alongside him to help him make sense of the world in his own way in his own time.

I would love to hear your thoughts 🧡

04/08/2026

When people see me with my children, they might think that giving my PDA kids autonomy means removing expectations, avoiding boundaries, or letting them do whatever they want.

But that's not what I'm doing at all.

Here's the thing..

PDA kids learn differently. And I noticed....

When I first join my child's world—whether that's pretending, being silly, dancing, or standing there with a bird on my head—they become much more open to joining mine.

It's as if autonomy creates the conditions for learning.

Not because there are no expectations.
Not because there are no boundaries.

But because my "picture" becomes meaningful enough for them to want to understand it.

Instead of trying to pull him into my way of seeing the world, we build a bridge between his picture and mine.

When PDA kids are given the space to build their own understanding, something important seems to happen.

They become more willing to learn from us.

Not because we're making them.
But because we've shown them that we're not there to take over their thinking—we're there to support it.

For me, that's what autonomy is really doing.
It's creating the conditions where learning can happen.

Sometimes autonomy makes difficult things fun.
Sometimes it makes children feel safe enough to explore.
Sometimes it simply gives them the space they need to make sense of what we're trying to teach them.

It reminds me of the grocery store example I shared earlier.

I allowed my son to slide with the plastic trolley. I stayed close, supervised him, and watched him carefully make thoughtful decisions about avoiding other people.

When he gently bumped the trolley into something, he learned something again.

Afterwards, we talked about it. He was able to tell me himself that it wasn't a good idea.

I didn't have to tell him. I didn't have to stop him before it happened. I didn't have to tell him off.

He figured it out through having the opportunity to experience it for himself. And he hasn't done it again since.

I think that's where autonomy is often misunderstood.

People can mistake fun and autonomy for a lack of boundaries. But they're not the same thing.

The destination often stays exactly the same.
The boundary often stays exactly the same.

What changes is how we help our child get there.

I don't use autonomy to avoid teaching.
I use it to make teaching possible.

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