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Childhood Events and Adult Stress Reactions Anyone who has experienced a near drowning episode knows that even getting into shallow crystal clear blue swimming pool can induce anxiety. For people who have nearly drowned, it is almost as if their brain has quicksand around any experience with large bodies of water. Get them close to the water, and they cannot help but begin to sink in strong, frantic memories of nearly drowning. Now researchers say that woman who were physically or sexually abused in childhood automatically get more aroused when placed in virtually any kind of stressful event. Quicksand, so to speak, loom throughout their brains. Emory University School of Medicine, Dr. Charles B. Nemeroff, chairman of psychiatry and behavioral sciences and a coauthor of a the study reports, "Clearly, here is an environmental event that causes changes in the brain and must interact with genetic vulnerability to influence whether or not you get this syndrome of hypersensitivity." In short, early childhood traumatic experiences profoundly effect brain chemistry, especially the brain's response to stress. In this case, nurture affects nature. It is easy to dismiss women who have suffered abuse in childhood as overreacting as adults. After all, from a logical point of view, the abuse occurred years ago, perhaps even decades ago. The person is no longer in danger. In fact, the person who abused the child no longer even be alive. The Emory University study is suggesting that these early childhood events literally change brain chemistry so the person is no longer the same before the event occurred. The event is much larger and more significant than the simple memory of the event. Children who are abused as children didn't just have a bad experience as a child. They were physically changed by the event. If a small child lost a limb, we would as take this into consideration of their performance as an adult. Actually, the child who has lost a limb, be mentally healthy, and physically impaired. But the child who has been abused, be physically healthy, but mentally impaired. Dr. Dennis Charney, in commenting on the study writes,
"You are born with a certain genetic constitution to handle many things,
including stress. But if the developing animal or human is faced with an
extraordinary amount of stress, those systems are going to be changed in
how they develop."
Janelle Barlow, Author
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