The Abused And Unloved Child

“It is so simple that only a genius could have figured it out.” So said Albert Einstein about Jean Piaget’s (1896-1980) theory on cognitive development. Jean’s world view straddled the period where religious institutions, particularly Catholic ones, locked up children with impunity with the assistance of craven governments all over the world in a heady mix of religious fervour set in a twisted logic wrapped around an immoral view of immorality.

The final irony of their logic was that the child will get over it or at least should. This latter excuse by the parents of children in an abused home self served them well too as an excuse as their actions of neglect went unchecked, for even a remote time of self reflection might have slowed the slide of permanent damage that they do to their child. What is known today and more importantly, should be known, is that there is a direct physical and biological correlation between a child’s development as well as a mental one with regard to the abused and unloved child.  

Choosing death over life is when the child makes it boldest and strongest statement by refusing food over touch, and is not limited to humans. It is that instinctive. Love is all encompassing for the development of the child and the mimicking of love within a foster home setting has it’s own rewards.

In the absence of this love in the early development of a child, the brain transmitters are short- circuited and information halted under the attack of a virus that invades the healthy neurons that transports vital supplies to the rest of the cognitive development of the child. In the nature and nurture debate you really cannot have one without the other by a very great imbalance.

This viral attack comes in all general forms like shouting, absence of food, left alone, the absence of cuddling or touch, no sense of self, no sense of belonging, the feeling of unworthiness, fear of being hurt, and the punishment of physical pain itself or the expectation of it. These factors alone amount to a very damaged child who is not aware that he or she is so.

Later in life, if that is an option, they will suffer high rates of ill health and death marked and dogged by depression, and if not helped with any kind of intervention or awareness, will have gone on to have children of their own who face the same fate as these parents where only the address has changed. Many will find peace in the only place they will aspire to be and not of this world.

I heard a man once say, years after a very traumatic event, that “he was over that now, past it, gone on with his life.” He then thought about what he had just said and cautioned the listener as well as himself, “ but then again I would be the last one to know.” It is good that things are really what they seem in others or within ourselves, and needs attending to if they are not and the courage hopefully to at least start.

Barry Clifford