Beyond Compliance: Why Our Children Deserve More Than Declarative Language

It is disheartening to constantly see the ongoing repetition of themes such as declarative language (which is more often than not, grossly misunderstood and misused) to disguise demands for PDAers. This is but one example. Declarative language is one example.

I am not stating declarative language is bad.

I am sharing that when we use declarative language to coerce our children - into tricking our children, that we run into greater issues of trust, and further relational infractions.

Declarative language is a helpful tool. I have run trainings on this myself.

However, when we look for instant solutions in order to control our children, we will find where we do not go deeper to learn more about ourselves, our short term solutions will have a limit - an end life that will be accompanied by residual stressors for the child who feels tricked or deceived.

The drive to get our children to do what we think is best for them is the joining one end of the line to another, creating a circle - a cycle. It is not progress. It is not self realisation or determination.

It is fundamentally, compliance.

I know, it is also safety for many. It is comfort. It is control.

But control is not self determination. It is an illusion.

It also relieves adults of deeper searching, deep reflection, inner work in order to set ourselves free enough to free our coming generations from the same internal prisons we exist within.

When the first of my four autistic children was identified autistic, I longed for her compliance. I longed for her compliance because I longed for our safety and comfort as a family.

I had spent my own life running from the trauma associated with being unidentified autistic, ADHD, and many other things. I had learned that masking was safety. Compliance was safety.

But it is not. It is never safe in the long term.

Compliance empowers and emboldens those with the most power - unexamined power. They ask for more, and more, and more and more and there is no real end to those with the least power making life easier for those with the most.

Those of us with the ability, capacity, support and safety to do so, have a responsibility to say no. But with that comes criticism, comes disdain, contempt, loss, grief, mourning, pain.

It also creates a pathway for those to come. It’s like walking along a winding track, with a harsh straw broom while we sweep the filth, the debris, the mould and stones aside so the track is smoother, just a little smoother.

I’m tired of seeing those in such positions that could create such change constantly offering little more than all the ways to have our children who are resistant with purpose and very good reason feel bad about who they are.

I’m tired of seeing all the ways in which we can ‘get around’ our children’s threat response, their NO, their teachings because we want them to comply because our comfort matters more.

“How can I say this in a gentler way to trick my child into going to school or doing the dishes?”

Imagine the early years of your life being about this. Your intuition, the ways you make meaning of the world, the truth you see, the lack of courage and exploration in the adults around you just be shut down.

“Just be quiet and do as you’re told.”

It doesn’t matter how we say it. The message is loud and clear.

I’m autistic and I see the bigger picture. Do you?

We fail our children when we do not hear them. We fail them when we only listen to extract the most vulnerable parts of who they are to use that against them.

“You like cars? I’ll take you to see the car races if you insert thing here.”

Grooming. Teaching how to overlook our intuition and our needs.

For all the banging on about regulation we do, we sure have no idea how to support our childrens’ intuition to be intact enough for them to know their own bodies, nervous systems and how to support themselves.

We are the dysregulation. Not the children. They are only a reflection of what exists in the world.

Until we see it; until we see ourselves, there will be no change.

Our children deserve more than declarative language.

KF