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A Guide to Pathological Demand Avoidance
for Young People
Glòria Durà-Vilà and Tamar Levi
To David and our amazing children, Josep and Mireia. (Glòria)
With love and gratitude for the support of my mother Sarah, the professional opinions of my sister Dalia Levi, the constant motivation
of my husband Vasilis Katsardis and the distracting entertainment of
our daughter Tova Niovi. (Tamar)
Acknowledgements
The author team would like to acknowledge the children who were under Dr Glòria Durà-Vilà’s care and who bravely let us into their world so we could understand it. We are also very grateful to their parents who were such strong advocates for their children and who worked with Glòria to offer the best possible care for them. You inspired and compelled us to write this book.
We cannot let this opportunity go by without paying tribute to a heroine of the publishing world, Jessica Kingsley, whom we are going to miss enormously after her retirement. Many thanks, Jessica, for your enthusiasm for our work and for your unique contribution to the literature on autism and mental health; it has been an honour and a privilege to publish our work with you.
This is a letter to you.
It could be called The Preface.
This means it’s at the beginning of the book.
Dear YOU,
We have written this book for you. You are in control of this book at all times. You can read it whenever you like. It doesn’t matter how long it takes you to go through the book, weeks or years, or if you choose to give some pages a miss – it doesn’t matter at all! You can choose to read it by yourself or with someone else. It is also up to you to decide whom you want to share it with.
You are an expert. You know yourself better than anyone
else. If anyone wanted to know anything about how you feel,
what you think and how you see the world, you are the best
teacher there is.
The goal of this book is that you understand
what PDA means for you. This will
help you and those adults close to
you to develop your talents and
to find ways to cope better with
your difficulties.
We have put a lot of information
about PDA in here. No two people
with these difficulties are the
same so it would be great if you
could help find which bits are right
for you and which bits are not. We would love to learn how your PDA is unique. This is so you and the important people around you – your parents, teachers or other trusted grown-ups – can have a better understanding of how PDA affects you.
You are the very best person to tell us about your PDA.
Wishing you all the best,
Glòria and Tamar
Two people wrote this book together. We will introduce ourselves now:
Hello, I’m Dr Glòria!
99.9 per cent of my patients call me Dr Glòria, which is easier to remember than my surname.
I studied medicine and child and adolescent psychiatry, and I specialise in Autism Spectrum Disorder.
Let me tell you how the book came to be: over the years, many children and young people who were told they had PDA have asked me to help them understand what having PDA was all about, and even more importantly, what PDA meant specifically for them.
Many parents and teachers have also asked how best to help
children and pupils to understand their difficulties. I thought it
would be easier if I made a book that you could take home, to
look at any time you wanted. Also, parents and
people who help you can read it to understand
and support you better.
As I did with my earlier child’s guide
to Autism Spectrum Disorder, My Autism
Book, I asked Tamar to help me with
the book. She didn’t need much
convincing this time either as
she loved the idea straightaway.
I will let Tamar introduce
herself now.
Hi, I’m Tamar!
It’s my job to explain things. Sometimes I explain things in pictures, as an artist for books. Sometimes I explain things as an author by writing them down. Sometimes I explain things in the classroom as a teacher. I spend all my time explaining things!
Dr Glòria told me all she knows about PDA and we worked hard figuring out how to explain it together. Plus, I’m a member of social media groups where I check with parents, carers and families how they would like to explain PDA too.
I made sure we left space for you to write and draw too. If you notice something missing, you can also write your own words in this book or make your own pictures to explain your own PDA.
This is a letter for your parents. You can share it with them if you want to.
Dear Parents,
We witness again and again, with awe and admiration, how you have bravely undergone
