Working out your PDAer’s window of tolerance can be tricky.
At our house it has taken lots of trial and error and really tuning into our PDAer. We have learned what the early signs of escalation are that tell us it’s necessary to pull back and focus on regulation. And we have also noticed the signs that tell us his tolerance is high, the times we can encourage him to reach up to additional demands.
We essentially have 3 tiers of expectations at our house. The set of expectations that we pick has to line up with our PDAers window of tolerance, the amount of energy he has available to him in any given week, day or moment. The expectations in these tiers will look different for every child and change over time but this is what it looks like for us at the moment.
Tier 1: Burnout and recovery
During periods of burnout, we literally bunker down and are in a crisis management situation. The priority is allowing time for our PDAer’s nervous system to recover.
- We drop absolutely everything possible and only hold boundaries around safety.
- No limits on screen time or around food.
- No mention of getting changed, bathing, teeth brushing.
- No expectation to leave the house.
- No expectation to be able to play safely with a sibling while I get things done around the house.
Even now, when we are in a stage of stability, we still go back to this tier as needed. Sometimes it’s necessary by the end of the day. Sometimes we stick here the day after a big outing. Sometimes it’s necessary for the whole week after we get back from holidays.
Tier 2: Stability
During stages of stability, we have loose/flexible expectations and we can decide in-the-moment if we are going to hold, negotiate or let it slide. On the let-it-side days we do our best to lead with empathy and acceptance rather than frustration and disappointment. Just because an expectation isn’t held today it doesn’t mean it’s forever. Our kids do well if and when they can.
These are examples of some of ours:
- Changing into clean clothes before we go out/ other days we accept he is going out in clothes he’s had on all week.
- Wearing sunscreen/ other days we negotiate a shady option, wearing a long-sleeved shirt or having a short play in the sun.
- Brushing teeth once a day/ negotiate to do them in the morning or let it go completely.
- Sticking to limits around treat food/ other days we say ‘yes’ to additional requests.
- We can get out of the house and spend time in safe places with safe people/ Other days we shorten the trip or divide and conquer (it might be that half the family goes out).
If we know we have to stretch for something like an appointment, a sibling birthday party, in preparation for having to be looked after by other people, or going on holidays. We often drop all our loose expectations pre-emptively in the lead up to bolster tolerance and then again afterwards to allow for recovery.
Tier 3: Stretch
On days where we gauge there is more tolerance we can stretch.
We encourage or indirectly suggest activities and they might be met with a ‘Yes’. We go in knowing that it’s still completely acceptable that our PDAer opts out.
For us stretch days might include:
- Managing 2 things in one day.
- Short shopping trips.
- Play dates with less familiar kids or where I want to talk to other adults.
- Friend’s birthday parties.
- Self-care tasks such as bathing, washing hair, haircuts, cutting nails.
- Learning opportunities.
When we are parenting PDA kids, we have to be constantly monitoring where our kid’s capacity is at. Figuring out the balance isn’t easy. It takes lots of trial and error but with time it does get easier. You start to pick up on the cues earlier, you prevent more meltdowns, encounter less periods of burnout, and for the inevitable meltdowns that you can’t prevent, the recovery becomes much faster, it becomes easier to bounce back to that stage of stability.
