I have two children — a daughter and a son. My daughter is 16 and has now left school, and my son is 7, so there are 9 years between them. This is quite a big gap for siblings and is down to circumstance rather than choice, and it has shaped their relationship in ways that are different to siblings closer in age. Add into that the fact my son splits his time between my house and his dad’s house, while my daughter lives with me full-time, and their relationship looks different again. And add into that my son is neurodivergent, and it becomes different in ways I never anticipated. As a parent of a PDA child, sibling relationships can look very different to what you might expect.

There have been times when my daughter has wanted his affection in the way she understands affection — cuddles, kisses, shared play. But that has never really been my son. He loves deeply, but he shows it differently. It hasn’t always matched what she needed, and it hasn’t always matched what she expected. My son has also really struggled with sharing me. I don’t know if that is because he is neurodivergent, or because he isn’t at my house all the time like my daughter. But there have been many occasions where he has asked me outright…

“Who do you love more, me or my sister?”

I think in his mind, it feels like I must love one more than the other. That there has to be a choice. That love is something that gets divided rather than something that just exists for both of them. Loving two people the same doesn’t fit neatly into the way he understands the world. It feels like there must be an order. A first place. A second place. Someone who is chosen. Because of that, I have always had to be careful to make sure they both feel included and secure in their own ways. But over time, they’ve found their own version of sibling love. When they do connect, they connect completely.

But now my daughter has her own life. There are days when I barely see her. Days when I barely speak to her. And while there is a quiet sadness in that for me, I know it is exactly what should be happening. She is growing up. She is building her own world. My son, however, is not ready for that world.

How a PDA Child Understands Sibling Relationships

Sunday dinner is sacred in our house. It is the only meal we all sit together at the table. It only happens once every two weeks when all three children are home, and it is also the only nutritious meal my son reliably eats. If you’ve read Am I a fussy eater?, you’ll know how hard-won that victory has been. But for the last two Sunday dinners my daughter has been out with her friends and we have plated up a meal but she hasn’t been home for dinner. The first time this happened my son was distraught…

“It just doesn’t feel the same without my sister here.”
“Why isn’t she here?”
“It’s just not right without her.”
“It feels weird without her here, doesn’t it?”

I explained that she was out with her friends and would be home later. That now she is older, she likes spending time with them. He listened, but I could see he didn’t fully understand. The next Sunday, it happened again.

The same empty chair.
The same questions.
The same sadness.

Then during half term, she went for a sleepover. She left early in the morning and didn’t come home until late the next day, long after he was asleep. It weighed on him more than I realised.

“Does my sister love her friends more than her family?”

The question stopped me. I told him no, of course she didn’t. But he followed with another question…

“Then why is she spending all her time with them?”

And in that moment, I realised this wasn’t really about my daughter. It was about how his brain understands love. He struggles with the idea that two things can be true at the same time. That loving one person doesn’t mean loving another person less. I have seen this before, and I wrote about it in “Mother’s Day and the Many Many Questions of My Child.”.  He once struggled to understand how my mum could be both my mum and his grandma. How my dad could be both my dad and his grandad. It took him time to understand that people can hold more than one role at once. That relationships overlap.

This is the same. To him, her absence feels like evidence. Like proof of something shifting. So I do what I have learned to do.

I stay consistent.
I reassure him.
I answer the same question as many times as he needs to ask it.
Because understanding doesn’t always come all at once. Sometimes it arrives quietly, through repetition and safety.

The next day, we went on a family trip to the seaside. I convinced my daughter to come with us, and my son barely left her side the entire day. He walked next to her. Sat next to her. Talked to her constantly. I could see how much he needed her.

I could also see, very clearly, how much he might have been driving her slightly mad. And in that moment, I realised something.

Maybe their relationship isn’t so different after all.

Just two siblings growing up — each in their own way.