More on trauma
This is a guest post I wrote elsewhere for National Adoption week, but thought I'd reproduce it here since I haven't posted in a while.
Trauma is a bit of a buzzword in the adoption community at the moment. The overwhelming majority, if not all, children who are adopted today will have experienced trauma of some kind, be it in person or in utero. The erroneous belief that a stable, loving home is all that is needed to make this go away is starting to give way to a deeper understanding of the effects of trauma, and the fact that whether they consciously remember it or not, this trauma will have a lifelong effect in several areas of that child's life.
"PTSD is a good definition for acute trauma in adults. (However when the trauma occurs in childhood) because children’s brains are still developing, trauma has a much more pervasive and long-range influence on their self-concept, on their sense of the world and on their ability to regulate themselves.” (Bessel van der Kolk)
One of the reasons adopters have to undertake a four-day prep course is to prepare us for living with the effects of this trauma. In both of o ur children it has affected the wiring of their brains and caused missing links, short circuits and dead-ends. With the right help, new connections can be forged over time to work around this, but the trauma will always be lurking somewhere in the background.
It's hard to live with, for us as well as them. The effects of trauma include problems attuning to the body's various biological states, difficulties with emotional regulation, an inability to be fully psychologically present in a situation, behaviour control, cognition (including attention and sensory integration), self-concept, and the ability to form secure attachments. And it doesn't always announce its presence. Sometimes it can creep up on you and you're up to your neck before you see it for what it is and realise that you should have handled something a completely different way. Other times, what you think is trauma may just be one of your child's particular personality quirks, or a perfectly normal developmental stage. Secondary trauma - where the child's trauma ends up transferring onto the adopters - is a thing.
Both adoptees and adopters need the right support to help them navigate this. We've been lucky enough to meet some fantastic trauma-aware professionals within adoption, health and education, who have done wonderful things for us. We've also come across some with less understanding, and heard horror stories of others who should know better. So we'll keep spreading the word. And know that if you come to visit us, trauma will probably be there. It'll probably be lurking behind the sofa, or under the bed, rather than right in your face (unless we're having a really bad day!) but it'll be there nonetheless.
Trauma is a bit of a buzzword in the adoption community at the moment. The overwhelming majority, if not all, children who are adopted today will have experienced trauma of some kind, be it in person or in utero. The erroneous belief that a stable, loving home is all that is needed to make this go away is starting to give way to a deeper understanding of the effects of trauma, and the fact that whether they consciously remember it or not, this trauma will have a lifelong effect in several areas of that child's life.
"PTSD is a good definition for acute trauma in adults. (However when the trauma occurs in childhood) because children’s brains are still developing, trauma has a much more pervasive and long-range influence on their self-concept, on their sense of the world and on their ability to regulate themselves.” (Bessel van der Kolk)
One of the reasons adopters have to undertake a four-day prep course is to prepare us for living with the effects of this trauma. In both of o ur children it has affected the wiring of their brains and caused missing links, short circuits and dead-ends. With the right help, new connections can be forged over time to work around this, but the trauma will always be lurking somewhere in the background.
It's hard to live with, for us as well as them. The effects of trauma include problems attuning to the body's various biological states, difficulties with emotional regulation, an inability to be fully psychologically present in a situation, behaviour control, cognition (including attention and sensory integration), self-concept, and the ability to form secure attachments. And it doesn't always announce its presence. Sometimes it can creep up on you and you're up to your neck before you see it for what it is and realise that you should have handled something a completely different way. Other times, what you think is trauma may just be one of your child's particular personality quirks, or a perfectly normal developmental stage. Secondary trauma - where the child's trauma ends up transferring onto the adopters - is a thing.
Both adoptees and adopters need the right support to help them navigate this. We've been lucky enough to meet some fantastic trauma-aware professionals within adoption, health and education, who have done wonderful things for us. We've also come across some with less understanding, and heard horror stories of others who should know better. So we'll keep spreading the word. And know that if you come to visit us, trauma will probably be there. It'll probably be lurking behind the sofa, or under the bed, rather than right in your face (unless we're having a really bad day!) but it'll be there nonetheless.
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