Chris Wells on PDA: Resistance and Resilience

Eric, thank you for this thoughtful reflection on how language evolves and can both illuminate and constrain our understanding. Your point about the irony of labels becoming simplistic designations hits home. When I first discovered 2e, including through Susan Baum's work, it was revelatory: finally, a framework that could hold the complexity of intense, asynchronous experience. But over the years, I've also seen that it's often inadequate for capturing the complexity of being multiply-exceptional. Being an outlier among outliers. This conversation with Katy emerged from exactly that tension. We kept circling back to these questions: What are we really saying when we describe someone as "high functioning"? Who benefits when we use functioning labels, and who gets left out or harmed? The scientific process you describe, with its cycle of hypothesis, experimentation, and replication, feels particularly relevant here. We need to keep interrogating these constructs, even the ones that have been helpful to us. What strikes me about your reflection is how you've maintained both appreciation for what 2e offered you as a parent and critical awareness of its limitations. That's the kind of intellectual honesty we need more of. And yes, Katy brings such depth and nuance to these conversations. Her ability to hold multiple perspectives while staying grounded in lived experience is remarkable. We're definitely planning to have her back.