Oprah Winfrey, Dr. Bruce D. Perry, Jello, Love and Childhood Trauma- They're Connected.

Hello,
It's Sunita here.

"Children are much more sensitive to developmental trauma than adults." So said Dr. Bruce D. Perry on 6o Minutes with Oprah on March 11, 2018. Dr. Perry is a leading authority on the subject of the effect and the impact of trauma on children. The key to healing, he shares with Oprah, is through the creation of positive relationships.

Oprah goes on to offer her take on what heals, by singling out love as the ultimate healer. I happen to agree with her 100%. I am a survivor of attachment and childhood trauma. My healing came about through Intensive Short Term Dynamic Psychotherapy, ISTDP. But the bottom line is something much simpler. Love pulled me back from the 'land of the dead' that I inhabited due to my childhood traumas.

Oprah credits her grade 4 teacher Mrs. Duncan to being the person who gave her a sense of value and connection. That led Oprah to feel and believe that she mattered.

I look back and try to understand what happened to my brain as a result of the developmental trauma I suffered. One way to explain the deficient wiring of my brain is by likening it to Jello.

The dissolved gelatin is supposed to set over a couple of hours. For this, one must leave it undisturbed during this setting time. In case of a traumatized young brain, the gelatin never "sets" into jello form. So it is constantly exists as a "liquid". Being in "liquid" form leaves it vulnerable to even the slightest of stimuli. Or even to the perception of any threat. Fight, flight or freeze are the only 3 responses a traumatized child possess to threats.

Going back to the jello analogy, one can compare this response to stress to the unset liquid jello splashing or spilling when the container it's in is disturbed.

An infant/child who grows up in a loving and caring household, with no traumatic history would have a brain that is similar to the "set jello". It has a distinct form and takes the shape of the bowl that it is contained in. It is still soft and vulnerable to being damaged, just like a healthy brain may, after an incident of trauma, but it possess the ability to absorb some of the negative stimulus without "splashing or spilling". This is the same as having resilience as a child or adult. This resilience helps us weather the inevitable storms that come our way, as we journey through life.

The only way a damaged brain can be rewired is through love. That is the way this "gelatin can set".

I leave you with this poem of mine from 'Stripping - My Fight to Find Me. It is the last of the collection of 65 poems in this book and so appropriately, gives the key to how I healed.

Wishing you a week of feeling connected and valued,
Be well Do well Live well
Love,
Sunita

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