Rabbi Shoshana's Blog

8 Things I Do to Live Well as an Autistic PDAer

I’m Autistic with a PDA profile. I was born with an overactive threat response that gets easily triggered, especially when I’m faced with...

Mar 24, 20246 min read

by Rabbi Shoshana Meira Friedman PDA stands for Pathological Demand Avoidance or Pervasive Drive for Autonomy, a little-known profile of...

Mar 14, 20246 min read

by Rabbi Shoshana Meira Friedman To understand why school is difficult or impossible for so many PDA children & teens, we need to know...

Feb 28, 20244 min read

by Rabbi Shoshana Meira Friedman When my son was 3, we started bringing him to a private Occupational Therapist to help with sensory...

Feb 17, 20244 min read

by Rabbi Shoshana Meira Friedman That's funny... you don't look PDA! My son & I are both Autistic with a PDA profile. PDA =Pervasive...

Feb 16, 20242 min read

by Rabbi Shoshana Meira Friedman I am what is known in the PDA community as an internalized PDAer. In this post, I explain what that...

Feb 16, 20245 min read

by Rabbi Shoshana Meira Friedman What is PDA? PDA stands for Pathological Demand Avoidance, or Pervasive Drive for Autonomy. The latter...

Feb 15, 20249 min read

by Rabbi Shoshana Meira Friedman These suggestions stem from my own experience as an Autistic person who has been in and out of limerence...

Feb 13, 20243 min read

by Rabbi Shoshana Meira Friedman As parents we look to our pediatricians to be experts in child development. But actually, most general...

Feb 11, 20243 min read

by Rabbi Shoshana Meira Friedman What is Limerence? Limerence is one name for infatuation with another person. It is not a regular crush....

Feb 3, 20245 min read

A Yom Kippur Sermon The last scene of the Disney movie Moana is one of the most powerful endings I’ve seen in a children’s movie. Moana...

Dec 1, 202311 min read

My husband, Yotam Schachter, and I got creative with the first ritual blessing of our wedding. Why? The traditional Jewish liturgy for...

Nov 1, 20232 min read

A Rosh HaShanah Sermon 2023/5774 Delivered at Temple Beth El of Portland, Maine Exactly ten-and-a-half years ago, I got on a plane to...

Oct 1, 202311 min read

Reb Nachman of Bratslav used to pray: רבונו של עולם Master of the Universe, grant me the ability to be alone; may it be my custom to go...

Aug 1, 20239 min read

My husband and I wrote this original ketubah (marriage contract) for ourselves. We liked it so much we wanted to make it available for...

Feb 15, 20235 min read