Developmental Trauma

        On an individual level, the Great Disconnect means feeling disconnected from our deeper selves, our emotions, intuitions and our subtle senses. And with this, a lack of inner peace or sense of purpose. It’s also feeling disconnected from nature and what’s harmonious to the soul. It’s a loss of relationship with the heavens above and the earth below—missing a sense of the order of things, even feeling all alone in the world, floating, not linked to anything real.
 
     What prevails is a lack of confidence or inability to trust that your core self is valued, worthy, or loved and that your simple beingness is enough.  This creates difficulty in creating harmonious and authentic relations to others, be they family, friends or primary relationships. Overall, there’s little or no deep sense of safety, intimacy or true belonging.

      In my opinion, this Great Disconnect is at the root of anxiety and depression in individuals, discontent in the culture and passing down of traumas within family lines.

       One effect of this mass cultural trauma—being disconnected from the rhythms of earth, life, and community—is the personal trauma that occurs between mother and child or between family/caretakers and child. Out of the overall disconnect from the natural world comes a lack of ability for mothers to deeply connect with their newborn infants in ways that children would come to know of their magical essence, their value as human beings on this earth and to truly establish their presence here on earth. 

       When there is this connection, as the child grows up, they don’t have to prove their value through accomplishment or adherence to family values. They are grounded in the knowing of their essential value. Where the essence of who they are is so valued, they have the freedom and psychological stability from which to stride forth, being true to who they are, regardless if they fit into any norm or expectation.

    Hence, with so many feeling out of connection, much has come to light through Affect Regulation and Attachment Theories, which helps explain the personal roots of emotional pain and addictive or negative behaviors. This speaks to the lost ability for a mother to calmly look into the eyes of her child consistently enough to let that little being feel welcome and safe. 

     It is also about the caregiver being unable to “be with” and respond to that growing child’s emotions in ways that helps the child not be overwhelmed by them but rather to contain, accept, and integrate them. When caregivers can be regulated themselves, this creates a healthy core connection. 

     When they can’t, dysregulation—disruption of the nervous system occurs called hyper arousal or sympathetic dominance, and usually continues for the remainder of a life. (until worked with) It is this ongoing state of hyper arousal that leads to so many emotional and physical health problems later in life, including various behavioral or chemical addictions that attempt to mask the discomfort. 

      Or when the arousal becomes too much, and the fear or distress becomes overwhelming, a parasympathetic override occurs, shutting down the intensity of arousal, creating a frozen shut down state instead. 

                           Now Called Developmental Trauma

All of this lack of attunement, various insecure forms of attachment in childhood and especially in infancy, along with neglect, stressful relationships between parents and more obvious physical forms of ongoing abuse or trauma are now being referred to as Developmental Trauma.

       “Folks with difficult parents often grow up with a “fear-driven brain” as I did—and it’s a huge relief to find out we’re not freaks — we’re a chunk of the mainstream.  In fact, maybe 50% of Americans have some degree of this “attachment disorder” due to parents who were too scary to attach to. Of course it’s not their fault either; odds are, our grandparents were too scary for our parents to attach to, and so on back, inter-generationally.” [1]

       “Developmental trauma starts in utero when we don’t have much more than a brain stem and goes on during the pre-conscious years. It can continue until 24 or 36 months depending on when the thinking brain (frontal cortex) comes on line.  That’s up to 45 months living in general anxiety to non-stop terror — before age 3.  A very long time to an infant. (and continues on after that)

      Developmental Trauma occurs as a continual process, not discrete incidents, while a baby has not developed a thinking brain able to recall incidents.  Frequently it occurs before there are any discrete incidents.”[2]

[1]  Sebern F. Fisher, MA  http://attachmentdisorderhealing.com/neurofeedback/

[2] http://attachmentdisorderhealing.com/developmental-trauma/

       When the mother does not take the time or have the patience to “attune” to the infant, or is not able to be with and respond to the infant’s emotions in relatively short order, the results can end up being part of Developmental Trauma. (See the Still Face Experiment by Edward Tronick.[1])

     When family stresses show up consistently—mixed with emotional and/or physical unavailability of one or both parents—this acts on young beings as a trauma, as does physical and/or sexual abuse. Watching one parent abuse the other physically or emotionally can form a trauma, also. So too, direct verbal degradation or when a child has to assume a parentified role. Although most never think of their “normal” childhoods creating trauma, it now has an official name in the psychology world—Developmental Trauma—while more obvious strong events are called Shock Trauma. 

[1] https://youtu.be/apzXGEbZht0 

         Dr. Joys one on one Work and The 7 Keys to Connection offer healing processes and tools for a way back to our human roots, our essential humanity. It’s about finding a true connection with our parts and all their humanness and vulnerabilities, our Self—and a connection to Earth and Spirit.  This is the process of healing Developmental Trauma

      Adopting into your life, what is experienced and gained in the one on one work and/or what is within the 7 Keys to Connection, you will ultimately bring forth more ease and harmony, both within and as reflected in outer living. As you seek to heal and transform your traumas and with this heal the core disconnect, you are able to touch others in your growing wholeness.

      Once inner and outer shifts have occurred through regular healing practices the habits of negative behaviors tend to fall away.  Blessedly you’ll move beyond the sense of emptiness, disconnection, psychological pain, and lack of meaning that drives addictive patterns and emotional distress.  As if by magic, this leaves you available for new choices, feelings, and ways to live life fully through new actions and connections. 

        At some point in the 7 Keys process, you will have pulled out the roots of the weeds of old emotions, beliefs, and burdens. You will have successfully transformed the parts of your inner being that held them. Perhaps you will also have called back and re-integrated lost or frozen parts of Self.  At that point, the seeds of new, healthy, soul-building practices will take hold. Allowing strong plants and beautiful flowers to bloom in the field that is your life.