Does your childhood influence who you are today ?
There are many Psychologists in history who have looked at childhood development theories, such as Freud, Piaget and Erikson, if you’re more interested in these people you can do some internet searches of your own to find out more. Essentially they wanted to find out what was normal and abnormal development in children, and whether their upbringing had anything to do with or had any influence over how they turned out. These Psychologists, to name but a few, looked at areas of children’s brain development and whether that was developing as it should, they also looked at their ability to form relationships and their personalities and how the children viewed the world, taking into account life events they were or had experienced. Some complex stuff, right? In short, here are some of the conclusions they came to :-
Childhood experiences can have profound effects on your life later on, but not always negatively, some adults have used those experiences to their advantage
The ability to form attachments with other people are affected, which can significantly influence how you are at home, at work, with other people generally. Having a secure and safe upbringing will help you in having more positive relationships, as an adult, and that you feel better about yourself. If you have close relationships with people - you will find it easier to combat stressful life events
The age and maturity of a person to experience traumatic events, such as the loss of a parent or sexual or physical abuse, will depend on how much you could understand what was happening when it happened and how you were affected. Despite knowing, as an adult, that you were not to blame, you may still feel some responsibility, which can affect you
Having negative experiences as a child may lead to reinforcing behaviour. For example, you may have been a shy and reserved, as a child, who was bullied at school, which further isolated you from others as you may have withdrawn from social situations. You may have grown in confidence as you got older, however, something happened or changed in a negative way which may have reinforced your belief that you were different (drawing comparisons to withdrawing yourself when you were younger) and engaging in self talk of “there must be something wrong with me”, which can influence the choices of people you have around you, or had around you, reinforcing connections from when you were younger
Your family or friends from childhood may inadvertently be reinforcing your vulnerabilities or insecurities, locking into patterns of behaviour
When you are exposed to minor stress in childhood and you have been good at managing the stress, this will lead to resilient qualities and help with building your stack of coping strategies
This leaves me to say that how you attach to other people and how you manage life events is important to your mental wellbeing, so having a chance to explore things from your past will help you to make better sense of what’s happening for you in the here and now. If you were to seek ongoing Counselling, beyond the scope of what we offer here, you may gain more understanding of who you are, past and present, identify your reinforcing behaviours, develop your self-esteem and expand your coping strategies.
Carol- EWG Counsellor