8 Ways Childhood Trauma and Adverse Childhood Experiences Impact (ACEs) Adult Health and Behavior

Hey there everybody, and welcome to this video on how childhood trauma impacts adult health and behavior. I'm your host, Dr. Donnelly Snipes. We've talked about trauma a lot in other videos, so I'm not going to do a deep dive here, but just to kind of sum it up, trauma can be intentional or unintentional. Intentional trauma is when somebody says I'm going to hurt you in some way. Unintentional trauma can be when they do it and they don't mean to, or they aren't able to actually meet the child's needs. So the child feels insecure, unsafe and disempowered. So trauma can include physical trauma, like physical pain or not getting their physical needs met. And that can be in the form of abuse or neglect. The caregiver who is too depressed to get up and go shopping and make dinner, or the caregiver who is too, too intoxicated to do those things. You know, that's more unintentional. They're not intending to hurt the child, but they can't get out of their own way in order to attend to the child. Emotional abuse is pretty self explanatory, but then there's emotional neglect. And that happens when the child's emotional needs are not met. They are not provided tools to I learn to identify, regulate, manage and cope with the feelings that they have. We're not born with emotional intelligence. Cognitive trauma can happen as a result of gaslighting or if the child is going through parental alienation where they're constantly being told negative, scary things. Environmental trauma can happen when the child suddenly loses their home. That's very jarring for a child who's used to structure, who's used to what's going on and then all of a sudden they're living in a car or living at a shelter. And relational trauma has a lot of forms, but the ones we're going to talk about include abandonment or rejection. So abandonment, as I put it, is when the caregiver leaves for some reason, whether they check out mentally or and emotionally or check out physically, either they move away or unfortunately they die. Something like that happens. Rejection is a little bit different. And that's an active process of telling the child that they're not worthy, that they don't deserve love. So what's the impact of this trauma? Well, think about it from the perspective of a child. A two year old, a five year old, an eight year old, they can't cook for themselves, they can't keep a roof over their head, they can't go grocery shopping, they can't get a job. You know, there's a lot of things they can't do that are obvious, not to mention, you know, they don't have the skills to survive on their own. So in infancy and toddlerhood, the child experiences a loss of safety and a sense of being disempowered. They're totally dependent when they cry, when they need something, they need their caregiver to give it. And if they don't, then it starts feeling scary. And, and in a lot of cases, they start experiencing physical distress, physical pain because their needs aren't being met. In infancy and toddlerhood, they may not know what they need. Sometimes, especially a toddler may get angry and really not know, okay, what that feeling is or what to do with it or I don't know what I need right now, but I need somebody to respond. Both infants and toddlers have difficulty communicating their needs. Toddlers may start having a little bit of a vocabulary, but they're not able to articulate in long sentences and help you understand what's going on. Infants and toddlers can't defend themselves from the onslaught of harm. So if they're feeling afraid of strangers or if they're feeling afraid of the dog, that they're not able, they're not big enough to defend themselves against harm. And we need to remember that in infancy and toddlerhood, children are thinking in what we call egocentric, concrete, personalized, all or none emotion based reasoning. And let's unpack that a little bit. When you're young, especially when you're toddlerhood and stuff, the child starts connecting. When I do this, this happens. I remember when my son was little and he used to be sitting in his high chair and he discovered the oh game. He would throw his bottle or something off of the high chair and he'd go, oh. And I'd pick it up and oh, he thought that was great fun. And then he throw it off again. He'd go, oh yeah, it got a little bit tiring. But he had determined a cause and effect. He was learning. He was developing what we call schema. And schema are the shortcuts that our brain stores based on prior learning to help us anticipate the future. So children are learning about their own safety, about their own power, about their ability to have others keep them safe through all of these interactions. Now, those schema, as I said, are egocentric. Children really young children believe that what they are experiencing is the exact same thing you're experiencing. They don't understand that there may be a different perspective. They're concrete. They can only deal with what's right in front of them. That's why with at this age group you can play peekaboo for 30 minutes and it never gets old. And it's personalized. The child at this point really needs care, really needs attention, really needs love. And so if their caregiver becomes angry or non responsive in some way that triggers a threat response because oh my gosh, you know, I must have done something and I must not be lovable. And it's in all or nothing terms, you know, it's either you love me or you hate me. You're going to provide or you're not. And it's emotion based. Children can't rationalize. Well, mom yelled at me because she's in a bad mood today. It has to do with her having a bad day at work and nothing to do with me. It's emotion based. They feel scared. They will react from, from fear in later childhood. Now we're talking elementary school, middle school. The child is still mostly dependent. They're still not able to do live independently. They still may not know exactly what they need to feel better or even what's causing them to feel scared or angry. They just, they have this feeling and it's like, I don't know, they still can't defend themselves against predators, if you will. They're still tending to think in concrete terms. They can only think about what's before them. They have difficulty hypothesizing or coming up with alternate explanations. They still tend to personalize things. What the caregiver does or doesn't do. They inter internalized is a direct result of their lovability of their worth. And it still tends to be emotion based because they're not able to rationalize why this is happening. It's just this is happening. I'm scared. I need help now. When children move into adolescence, they become a lot more independent. But up until a point they're still somewhat dependent. If not, once they get into, you know, high school and stuff, they may be driving, they may be doing some other things, but there's still an element that is looking for guidance. The brain has not completely developed yet. They are still learning skills and tools for life. They do however, have more formal thought and they're able to think about alternate perspectives and alternate explanations for why something may happen. They may be less likely to personalize things and I say may because some people carry that personalization from childhood. It was so chaotic and so dangerous where they grew up, that they are desperate to make sure that whoever is in their life that they want in their life approves of them. So anytime somebody shows any inkling of disapproval, they start to feel terrified because they think it must be me. Just like in the past it was me. Or at least the schema they developed said it was me. So they're carrying that into the present. And a lot of adolescents are very emotion based. They're still very reactive. The impulse control areas, that prefrontal cortex is still developing. So it's important to help adolescents learn how to tolerate distress, get into their wise mind so they can use fact based instead of emotion based reasoning. Help us continue to make practical tools available to everybody by supporting the channel. You can donate any amount at Docsnipes.com/donate or on cash app at Doc Snipes you can become a member of the YouTube channel@doc snipes.com join or if you need continuing education, you can earn ceus@allce.com so what is the impact of all of this? If a child experiences abuse or neglect when they're growing up, if they feel unsafe and disempowered, we what happens? The brain changes, the body changes, they become hypervigilant to harm or abandonment. So in the present they need to create safety and they need to be able to learn those distress tolerance skills so they can get in their wise mind and say in, in this context at this time, am I safe? That hypervigilance isn't going to go away overnight. And it's important to embrace that as a protective mechanism that developed to help them stay safe in the past. But to also start sort of reprogramming the sensitivity of that fear monitor. And by using those fact based tools we see HPA access dysregulation. People who've experienced trauma become hypervigilant. Their threat response system, their HPA axis becomes dysregulated and, and doesn't respond as it should. And in order for that stress response to heal, in order for it to recalibrate to being in a safer, more empowered situation, it's important that the person works on reducing physical and emotional stress. And you can't reduce all of it, but reduce the unnecessary stuff, the person who's experienced trauma in childhood is at a much greater risk of stress related illnesses. You can look at the research on adverse childhood experiences and see the direct correlation between childhood trauma and development of mental health as well as physical health issues in adulthood. We see emotional dysregulation. Now I Already said HPA axis. So that stress response system may not respond as it should to stress. But emotional dysregulation is when somebody reacts either flat or furious when they react to a stressor. Oftentimes it is a much stronger reaction than somebody who hasn't experienced trauma. They instead of having a trickle of stress hormones, they have a tsunami because their brain is saying, okay, we are not safe. We need to fight to the death here. Mindfulness and distress tolerance skills can be very helpful for people who emotionally dysregulate. Being compassionate with yourself, recognizing the dysregulation is a symptom of, of the trauma, recognizing that the disregulation will likely improve a lot as the HPA axis becomes healthier, but then becoming mindful of what triggered that feeling, what triggered that emotion, how to prevent it in the future, whether you're safe in the present, and developing skills to tolerate the distress. When people dysregulate, they just don't, you know, dysregulate. And then when it's gone, they turn it off again. It takes them a lot more time to go back to baseline. During that time that they're de escalating, it's uncomfortable. So developing those distress tolerance skills that say, okay, this really stinks right now, and I will be able to get through it. Anxiety and depression are very common impacts of trauma. So recognize your triggers for anxiety and depression. A lot of times those triggers come from prior experiences, those schema that you have in your brain. And you need to ask yourself, in this context at this time, am I safe? At this context in this time, am I empowered? Because remember, the crux of depression is hopelessness and helplessness, and anxiety is a response to a threat. So you need to feel safe and empowered. Impulsivity is another impact of trauma. And actually a lot of the ADHD symptoms may be an impact of trauma. So help people define when they're not stressed out or at least as calm as possible. Help people define their rich and meaningful life to determine their best use of their energy. Now it's not going to be, oh, okay, I know what to do now. And all of a sudden you change your behaviors. No, it's not going to happen that way. But you need the foundation awareness. Have them identify their vulnerabilities. What makes them more likely to, to behave impulsively when they've had too much caffeine, when their blood sugar is low, when they're exhausted, when they're in pain, what is it that makes them more vulnerable to being impulsive? And how can they prevent that or at least mitigate it when it happens? And then again, those good old distress tolerance skills to turn off that autopilot when something happens, they feel enraged, okay? They dysregulate, they feel enraged, they want to fight or flee, okay? That's an emotion based reaction. Using distress tolerance skills, they can get into their wise mind and instead of reacting out of fear, they can proactively act. They can proact based on the facts in the current situation, asking themselves, once they disengage that autopilot, asking themselves, okay, what are the facts in this situation at this time? Am I safe? And and here comes that rich and meaningful life. What is the best use of my energy right now to help me move toward that rich and meaningful life? Sometimes it may mean just ignoring what, what just happened. You know that the trolls or the person who cut you off in traffic because it's not a good use of your energy. Cognitive distortions are also common in trauma because remember that trauma happened when the child was using much more primitive thinking styles. So personalization is important to address for somebody who's experienced trauma. They learn to take things personally. They learn to be hypervigilant to rejection because rejection was not safe. Rejection meant that there wouldn't be anybody to take care of them. So instead of personalizing everything, asking themselves, what are three other explanations for why this might be happening besides me? Overgeneralization is another cognitive error. When you think that I failed this test, so I'm a failure, or this person rejected me in the past, therefore everybody's going to reject me, or my caregiver was unwilling to meet my needs, therefore nobody will ever meet my needs. So we have this extreme overgeneralization. We need to recognize the specifics of the situation and look at how is that situation in the past similar to what's going on right now and different from it. How am I different? How is the situation different? All or nothing thinking. Find exceptions. If you notice you're using words like every time, never all, nothing, what are exceptions? Change your language to say most of the time or a lot of people. And then emotion based reasoning, which we've already talked about multiple times, that's a cognitive distortion. Assuming that because you feel anxious, that there is a threat is inaccurate. When you feel anxious, just like that smoke alarm, when that smoke alarm goes off, it may mean there's a fire, but not necessarily when you feel anxious, it may mean there's a threat, but not necessarily so. It's important to identify emotion based reasoning and ask yourself, what are the facts in this situation in this context at this time? Boundary disruption is another impact of trauma. When caregivers either were all over your boundaries, telling you what you should think, how you should feel, etc. Or they were completely disengaged, then the child was not able to learn how to set healthy boundaries. So mindful awareness of boundaries is really important. It's an important skill to develop in people who've experienced trauma. A lot of times their boundaries are very, very weak because it was like, whatever you want me to be, whatever you want me to believe, I'll do it just to make sure that you'll take care of me. That was the child's perspective. So they didn't learn that it was safe to set boundaries and assert differences and be authentic. So one of the interventions will be starting to become aware of your boundaries. What are your thoughts on things? What are your feelings and your reactions to things? What do you need right now? Start being aware of that. Even if somebody else doesn't need, doesn't mean you don't need it. And this can be as simple as the temperature. And we're constantly arguing about that in my house because I am always hot, and other people tend to be cooler than. Than I am. So I'm saying I need it to be cooler right now. And they're going, you're crazy. It's like 68 degrees in here. Boundaries. I'm not telling them they're wrong. You know, I have no right to tell them that they're hot and they just don't realize it. However, I'm respecting mine and going, okay, y' all are fine. I'm hot, so how can I solve that problem? So mindful awareness of boundaries and then assertiveness skills to respect and maintain those boundaries, getting other people's opinions, thoughts, feelings, asking them what they need, it doesn't mean that you'll give it to them necessarily. But respecting and maintaining those boundaries, I hear that you want or I hear that you need, and this is what I can and cannot do. Difficulty trusting others. Well, if you grew up in a traumatic environment where you regularly, if not constantly, felt unsafe and disempowered, then, yeah, it's going to be really hard to trust others, because guess what? The people who were put on this earth to protect you didn't do it. Trauma processing is going to be necessary, and it's not something you can generally do on your own. You know, I recommend people do it with their therapist or a pastoral counselor or somebody, but it's going to be important to process prim, what I call primary traumas. Things that you look at and go, oh, that was traumatic, but also secondary losses as a result of primary traumas. So maybe your parents got divorced in this really nasty divorce. Okay, that would be a primary trauma. What did you lose as a result of your caregiver's divorce in terms of things that you were able to do? Maybe you couldn't be on the XYZ team anymore because when you were with the other parent, they couldn't get you to practice. You know, there are things that happen, but it's important to process those traumas. It's important to process maybe you lost as a result of something. You lost a caregiver's ability to be there for you. You know, your par, your caregiver primary trauma, they developed major depressive disorder or a, a wicked addiction or something, and all of a sudden, poof. They may be physically there, but they are not able to meet your needs anymore. So what did, what else did you lose as a result of that happening? It will be important as you process trauma to also to start developing a secure attachment to your inner child so they can feel safe. That child that experienced those traumas, those memories of that trauma, they're still in there. And I want you to sort of envision it as a little child huddled in the corner. Okay? Now it's time to start responding to that child and recognizing if you get angry about something, recognizing that that may be that child coming out going, I gotta protect you. I'll try to protect you, because nobody protected them. It's important for you now as a grown up or almost grown up to say, I got this. You don't have to protect me anymore. Many of the mood and behavioral symptoms people identify are often responses a person has learned as a result of trying stay safe during traumatic situations in the past. Think about how might this behavior be something you learned in childhood to stay safe and you just carried it into adulthood? When you felt threatened, you threw a temper tantrum, or when you felt like things were out of control, you would withdraw. When addressing stress related illnesses, it's also important to address trauma because the persistent stress and hypervigilance, this dysfunction of that HPA axis will maintain HPA axis dysregulation. So we need to help people heal their nervous system because that will continue to have a negative impact no matter how much they try to change their thinking style.