24/04/2024
When a baby is born only the more primitive parts the nervous system (CNS) is well developed, so there’s not a lot of difference between a modern baby and a primitive one. The primitive CNS is in control, and that’s fine for a baby, but it takes another 25 plus years for our brain to bring us up to date with the world we are born into.
Why is this a problem?
The problem isn’t so much that we are dependent helpless babies; it’s that we are a primitive dependent helpless babies.
It’s as if every mother’s womb is a time-machine delivering prehistoric babies into an increasingly new and evolving era of human society and development. I believe this could be part of the reason why mental health issues are on the rise.
To make things worse our baby brains are thrown into hyperdrive in its Herculine effort to catch up and overtake the CNS. In our first year the brain is flooded with huge doses of neuroplastic chemicals to develop all the basics, but then it’s a downhill run to do all the major pruning and tuning for everything we will need for our future adult life, all by around the age of eight.
I think you can see why this could be a problem.
We now know that attachment is a central part of this story. These early social interactions profoundly influence a child’s emotional, cognitive, relational, and neurological development. In essence attachment is an elegant dance between safety (feeling secure) and danger (feeling insecure) that helps us to recognise the music of an uncertain world, and to survive.
As we strive to control safety (because we often can’t control danger), the child’s brain creates an internal sense of safety when safety isn’t readily available externally. A child’s vulnerability can have them feeling unsafe in an infinite array of situations, from a parent being on the phone to a potentially life-threatening experience.
Dissociation is one of the brain’s primary ways to create a felt sense of safety. Research shows that this defensive shutdown is enabled by neurochemicals such as endogenous opioids and cannabinoids, which create a numb feeling of being disconnected from emotions, the body, environment, and other people. It’s our brain’s way of managing fear and pain, but you’ll probably recognise these in a range of adult situations too, from being blinded by anger to being blind drunk.
These natural attempts to control safety become interpersonal styles thatimpacts us later in adult life. Adult attachment styles are usually categorised into four main types: Secure, Avoidant-Dismissive, Anxious-Preoccupied, and Disorganized-Unresolved (sometimes called Fearful Avoidant). However, these patterns are more fluid than these suggest because styles overlap depending on situations. Nobody is 100% secure in their attachment, and everyone has attachment ‘issues’.
Attachment work is a wabi-sabi affair.
Unresolved attachment styles can cause havoc until we recognise that as adults, we have a lot more options to be safe in this world than we had when we were small. By acknowledging these options, and then witnessing these interpersonal patterns as essentially old ‘primitive ‘rescuers from our childhood, we can begin the process of forming secure relationships. The most important secure relationship we need is with ourselves, and this is where therapy and good psychoeducational books can step in.
