"Low-demand parenting requires radical acceptance. It says to the kid right in front of you, I see you, just as you are. - You are ok here. I love you right here." Parent to neurodivergent children and autistic adult, Amanda Diekman, outlines a parenting approach that finally lowers the bar for the whole family, enabling the equilibrium of the home to be restored. Low-demand parenting allows you to drop the demands and expectations that are making family life impossible and embrace the joyful freedom of living life with low demands. It can be a particularly effective approach for children with high anxiety levels including neurodivergent children. Amanda talks from experience and teaches you how to identify what the big, tiny and invisible demands are for your own child and gives you the step-by-step instructions on how to drop them. Full of practical resources and scripts that are easy to implement in busy everyday life, this book is your flashlight and your map to parenting your uniquely wired child. It will not tell you where to go, but it will help you find your way so you and your family thrive.
Amanda Diekman is soulful Presbyterian pastor, spiritual director, coach, and autistic contemplative. She has been published at Not An Autism Mom, PDA Parents, the Mighty, and Motherly. She lives in Durham NC with her husband and 3 children.
Chapter One: My Story 5 Chapter Two: The Neuroscience of Connection 16 Chapter Three: Uniquely Wired Kids 22 Chapter Four: Low-Demand Parenting 25 Chapter Five: How to Drop Demands 38 Chapter Six: How to Get Started with Low-Demand Parenting 60 Chapter Seven: Practical Examples 62 Chapter Eight: Low-Demand Parenting & Screens 69 Chapter Nine: A Low-Demand Approach to Screens 76 Chapter Ten: Low-Demand Co-Parenting 88 Chapter Eleven: A Low-Demand Approach to Co-Parenting 93 Chapter Twelve: Toward a Thriving Future 109 RESOURCES 115 FOR FURTHER READING 129 Acknowledgements 133 About The Author 135
Short, easy-read guide for parents on how to reduce family conflict by dropping unnecessary demands from daily life to help neurodivergent families to thrive.
•Clear and simple language that is easy for a busy parent to pick up and begin to immediately implement strategies
•The author has lived experience of both parenting neurodivergent children and being autistic herself so is very qualified to write this book.
•The author has a lot of support from other big autism advocates like Megan Ashburn who could help with marketing and pushing this title.
