Developmental trauma and its effects: an interview with Raquel Molero

A disorder initiated in childhood that develops in adulthood from an emotional wound.

Childhood is a vital stage in which the possibility of developing psychological traumas makes us especially vulnerable. As children we have fewer tools to cope with situations that can mark us emotionally in a negative way. In addition, the after-effects of these experiences remain in adulthood.

On this occasion, we will interview Raquel Molero Martínez we will interview Raquel Molero Martínez, psychologist of the ARA Psicología center in Barcelona in Barcelona, so that she can explain to us what one of the most relevant phenomena in psychotherapy consists of: developmental trauma.

The emotional impact of developmental trauma

Raquel Molero Martínez is Director of ARA Psicología, psychologist specialized in the clinical and health fields, and EMDR therapist. Here she will talk to us about the characteristics of developmental trauma from her perspective as an expert in psychotherapy.

What is developmental trauma?

Trauma comes from Greek, and means wound. It is the imprint left in our organism by past events; trauma is anchored in the mind, body and brain.

Human beings start from a bonding system that is totally dependent on our parents or primary caregivers. The attachment relationships we establish in infancy help us to understand the way the world works, relationships with other people and conflicts; to shape our identity, our sense of self.

Developmental trauma occurs when attachment figures have also been a source of threat. Developmental trauma damages our defense systems (which tell us what to fear or what things can hurt us) and attachment systems (the way we bond and disengage with important people in our environment).

Traumatic experiences leave an imprint on our emotions, on our way of seeing and enjoying life and our relationships with others or with ourselves, and even leave an imprint on our biology and our immune system.

Nevertheless, trauma is a wound, and like all wounds it has the capacity to heal, to be further damaged or transformed. But in any case it is a treatable emotional injury.

Surely almost everyone has gone through difficult situations during childhood. What are the characteristics of situations that leave this traumatic imprint on people's minds? Can these be one-time experiences, or must they occur over long periods of time?

Our system is wise, from an early age we generate mechanisms that help us to defend ourselves from what happens in our environment. These defenses are like a shield that protects us in situations where the threat was too great or too intense and we felt we could not cope with it.

The smaller we are, the less tools we have to defend ourselves, the more fragile we are and the more likely it is that our organism experiences what happens outside as a threat. If this happens repeatedly or too intensely, the body generates strategies to get out of the situation by blocking the associated emotions.

Situations that are potentially traumatic in childhood, when we speak of developmental trauma, are, for example, situations of intrafamilial abuse or neglect, repeated sexual abuse, mental disorder of one or both parents, death of a parent, excessive overprotection..... Or when caregivers were not available physically or emotionally in a consistent and stable manner.

Thus, when we speak of developmental trauma we are talking about situations that occur early in life, are chronically repeated over time, and are so intense that they prevent us from developing one or more parts of ourselves in a healthy way.

Traumas that are generated after punctual, sudden and negative situations can be called shock traumas. Such as, for example, natural disasters, survivors of war or terrorism, kidnapping, surgeries, injuries, accidents and falls, problems at birth, rapes, animal attacks, burns...

What are the typical symptoms of developmental trauma?

The symptoms of developmental trauma can be many: from anxiety, stress, depression, impulse control difficulties, inattention, hyperactivity, obsessions, feeding problems... to more complex syndromes, such as migraine, irritable bowel or chronic pain.

The capacity for self-regulation and healthy social engagement are often impaired in developmental trauma. And that limits our ability to feel safe in the world around us.

When our attachment system is insecure, our interpersonal relationships both with our family and with our partner or friends may be affected, being unstable, toxic or unsatisfactory.

In addition, if the defense system is also damaged, security will be affected, which can influence our way of dealing with conflicts, stressful work situations, fear of being exposed in front of others or intimate relationships with other people.

How can being raised in an inappropriate context affect us in adulthood?

Repeated relational events, especially those related to attachment (humiliation, teasing, criticism, excessive overprotection, neglect, abandonment, unsafe context ....) impact on one's beliefs about oneself, others and the world. They can affect feelings of safety, self-esteem, self-confidence, self-definition, or optimal behavior.

Developmental trauma can generate a disconnect between the physical Self and the emotional Self; and with it, comes difficulty relating to others, knowing what we need, trusting others, or setting healthy boundaries. And we may have a tendency to re-experience the same thing in our interpersonal relationships, as if we were always in a loop that keeps repeating itself.

We may not be able to feel our emotions at all, or if we do, we may feel them in a disproportionate way and find it difficult to return to a state of calm.

Repeated exposure to psychosocial stressors, such as abuse, increases the risk of developing more severe and far-reaching traumas and symptoms, including drug use and suicide attempts.

Is it difficult for an adult to realize that his or her quality of life is being eroded by developmental trauma?

Traumatic experiences freeze us, we lose the ability to evolve over time, to adapt that belief, defense mechanism or emotion to the environment and the situation. We remain anchored in the past, stuck, and we use rigid strategies to face different situations, with ineffective behavioral patterns.

Many times we do not realize that this happens because we are used to function that way, to defend ourselves from others in a specific way and to choose the same type of relationships.

It is as if our personality were a tower that is tottering because the foundations are not well fixed. We, who are on top of the tower trying to defend ourselves from our enemies, never see what is happening, we only notice that the tower is wobbling, without knowing why. We need someone to help us look at the tower from the outside and repair it to look again at what is really outside.

And what can psychologists do to help people with developmental trauma?

The job of therapists is to help people to be in connection with their body and their emotions, to recognize and experience the reality of every facet of their life and experience. To be able to be in touch with pleasure and also with suffering, being honest with themselves.

The practice of body awareness, the installation of healthy resources and emotional regulation tools that allow the patient to be in balance with himself, and a self-care that arises spontaneously and not forced, would be the first steps to reestablish the capacity for resilience and self-healing.

Once we have sufficiently stabilized the patient, we can renegotiate the trauma and give the body time to reorganize the traumatic experience so that we can integrate it into our system in a healthy way. This will help us regain the ability to be in tune with others, foster trust and healthy interdependence.

From our intervention more based on the body and its reactions; we need to establish a cooperative process with the patient to contain, process and integrate their sensations to make them more adaptive and sustainable.

And so, over time, it is important to generate healthy bonding relationships, with themselves and their environment, being able to set limits, establish appropriate boundaries and at the same time have the ability to integrate a loving relationship with others.

For parents who are just starting a family and may be concerned about their parenting style as they read about developmental trauma... what would you tell them?

First, I would advise them to heal their own developmental trauma. Recognizing and dealing with their own emotional wounds is the first step to healthy parenting. Knowing oneself, one's defenses, physical-emotional reactions and self-regulating. As they say on airplanes, put oxygen in us first in order to save our children.

Secondly, I would tell them not to worry about getting it wrong, you have to get it wrong many times! Imperfections in caregiving will allow our children to form their character, their own shields, their defense system. They will need it when they are adults!

And finally, they should not forget about affection, acceptance, love, connection, freedom and autonomy. In short, our mission as parents is to make our children make a healthy differentiation and interdependence, loving each other very much, taking care of each other and making a good process of individualization that allows them to become healthy adults.