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by Katie-Jo Gracie (Author)
Many families raising PDA children find themselves trapped in harmful relationship patterns - often encouraged by well-meaning professionals and support systems. These control-focused approaches, built around forcing "normality," erode self-worth, damage trust, and stand in direct conflict with Christian love.
Peaceful Parenting with PDA challenges the harmful norms that have taken root in autism and neurodiversity support. It charts a different path: faith-based parenting that honours boundaries and affirms each person's God-given identity. Drawing on Scripture, personal stories, and a rigorous examination of professional practices, Gracie reveals how authentic Christian parenting - grounded in respect, safety, and unconditional love - enables both children and adults to truly flourish.
Written for Christian parents, teachers, and faith communities, this book is a call to turn away from controlling approaches and build relationships rooted in genuine respect and transformative love.
Inside, you'll find:
- A clear, compassionate overview of PDA - including its impact on siblings, marriage, faith, and family life
- Practical strategies to create a safer, calmer home environment
- Guidance on building routines that reduce anxiety without rigid schedules or power struggles
- Tools for deep listening, respecting autonomy, and holding healthy boundaries
- Step-by-step support for difficult moments before, during, and after meltdowns - centred on regulation, not punishment
- Gentle approaches to fostering independence and self-advocacy, rather than imposing "life skills" that can break trust
- Honest, balanced advice on school, home education, and managing anxiety-based absence
- Insight into why sleep is so challenging for PDA families - and what can help
- Practical guidance for churches on inclusion and challenging unhelpful beliefs
- Ideas for helping grandparents, relatives, and friends offer meaningful support
- Encouragement to tend to your own well-being, so you can parent from a place of strength
- Prayers, blessings, and liturgies for hard days, school-refusal mornings, and everything in between
"Peaceful Parenting with PDA" does not promise quick fixes or miracle solutions. Instead, it offers a deeper approach: parenting that respects your child's God-given neurotype. It also values your own limits and trusts in God, who knows and loves. Peaceful Parenting with PDA makes no promises of quick fixes or miracle solutions. Instead, it offers something more lasting: a vision of parenting that honours your child's God-given neurotype, respects your own limits, and trusts in a God who knows and loves your family more deeply than any professional ever could. If you are looking for practical help, spiritual encouragement, and a gentler, more hopeful way forward - this book is for you.
