The Deepest Well: Healing the Long-Term Effects of Childhood Trauma and Adversity—A Transformative Guide to Understanding Childhood Trauma and Health

by Nadine Burke Harris

For most of early human history, the biggest stressors (stress-inducing events) were predators (short-term stressors) and food shortages (long-term stressors). Back in the day on the savanna, a major purpose of cortisol was to help the body manage that long-term stress. Maintaining homeostasis is the key to survival, so cortisol shows up when the body detects a change in the environment that threatens to push it off balance. With a shortage of supermarkets (and iPhone apps) in prehistoric Africa, early humans spent most of their days finding food, killing food, and preparing food for eating. When times were tough, the body would detect a lack of nutrients and begin the chain reaction that is the stress response. One of the biggest parts of this process is the increased production of cortisol, and a major effect of cortisol is an increase in blood sugar. The brain needs enough blood sugar to be able to think and plan, so this extra punch of cortisol helps keep blood sugar on an even keel, despite a shortage of gazelle BBQ. The steady stream of glucose swimming in your veins also helps fuel your muscles, so in the event that you do see a gazelle, you have the energy to chase it down. Cortisol also helps maintain normal blood pressure by regulating the body’s water and salt levels. And it inhibits growth and reproduction, because if you are living through a food crisis, it’s not a good time to be doing any optimistic long-term family planning; it makes more sense to divert al...