There’s a myth I hear over and over, from well-meaning teachers, providers, and even from myself on hard days: if a kid made it through school, they should be able to manage the rest of the day too.
I wish that were true. But capacity doesn’t work that way, not for PDA kids, and honestly, not for most of us.
Here’s what that myth misses: imagine a child who completes their schoolwork, no problem, and then falls apart at home over a single homework question. It looks like a contradiction. It isn’t. A closer look usually reveals what the school day actually cost: a skipped lunch, a rough night of sleep, ongoing tummy pain nobody connected to anything until now. The worksheet was never really the problem. It was just the moment the cup finally overflowed.
So when my kids come home, I’ve stopped treating the afternoon like a continuation of the school day. Instead, I try to start with recovery, before anything else is asked of them:
- Food, even if it’s just something small
- Simply drinking water can help with regulation
- A real chance to use the bathroom
- A quiet space, or movement, whichever their body is asking for
- Connection (low-demand check-in), if they want it
If pain or sleep struggles keep showing up, that’s worth bringing to their clinician, not just chalking up to “a rough patch.”
Homework gets renegotiated too. I’d rather work with a school on a plan that actually fits: less volume, a different format, a different time of day when there’s more capacity, than force a worksheet through when there’s nothing left to give it.
And evenings get planned together, not around them. What are screens actually giving them right now? What would help them wind down instead? What effect is any of this having on their sleep? These aren’t rhetorical questions; they’re ones I ask out loud, with my kids, not just about them.
None of this is about lowering the bar forever. It’s about meeting the day as it actually is, not as we wish it were.
So here’s what I’d leave you with, the same question I keep asking myself: what could you take off the afternoon agenda this week, to make room for recovery?
