Childhood Disrupted Quotes

“Interestingly, recurrent humiliation by a parent caused a slightly more detrimental impact and was marginally correlated to a greater likelihood of adult illness and depression. Simply living with a parent who puts you down and humiliates you, or who is alcoholic or depressed, can leave you with a profoundly hurtful ACE footprint and alter your brain and immunologic functioning for life.”
― Donna Jackson Nakazawa, Childhood Disrupted: How Your Biography Becomes Your Biology, and How You Can Heal

“Adults with Adverse Childhood Experiences are on alert. It’s a habit they learned in childhood, when they couldn’t be sure when they’d face the next high-tension situation. After her terrifying childhood illness, Michele never felt at peace, or whole, as an adult: “I was afraid I could be blindsided by any small medical crisis that could morph and change my entire life.”
― Donna Jackson Nakazawa, Childhood Disrupted: How Your Biography Becomes Your Biology, and How You Can Heal

“It was as if I’d been running from my past, my story, my pain, and I’d run smack into myself again,” she says.”
― Donna Jackson Nakazawa, Childhood Disrupted: How Your Biography Becomes Your Biology, and How You Can Heal

“When the brain can’t moderate our biological stress response, it goes into a state of constant hyperarousal and reactivity. Inflammatory hormones and chemicals keep coursing through the body at the slightest provocation. In other words, when a child is young and his brain is still developing, if he is repeatedly thrust into a state of fight or flight, this chronic stress state causes these small, chemical markers to disable the genes that regulate the stress response—preventing the brain from properly regulating its response for the rest of his life.”
― Donna Jackson Nakazawa, Childhood Disrupted: How Your Biography Becomes Your Biology, and How You Can Heal

“RESILIENCE QUESTIONNAIRE Please circle the most accurate answer under each statement: 1. I believe that my mother loved me when I was little. Definitely true Probably true Not sure Probably not true Definitely not true 2. I believe that my father loved me when I was little. Definitely true Probably true Not sure Probably not true Definitely not true 3. When I was little, other people helped my mother and father take care of me and they seemed to love me. Definitely true Probably true Not sure Probably not true Definitely not true 4. I’ve heard that when I was an infant someone in my family enjoyed playing with me, and I enjoyed it, too. Definitely true Probably true Not sure Probably not true Definitely not true 5. When I was a child, there were relatives in my family who made me feel better if I was sad or worried. Definitely true Probably true Not sure Probably not true Definitely not true 6. When I was a child, neighbors or my friends’ parents seemed to like me. Definitely true Probably true Not sure Probably not true Definitely not true 7. When I was a child, teachers, coaches, youth leaders, or ministers were there to help me. Definitely true Probably true Not sure Probably not true Definitely not true 8. Someone in my family cared about how I was doing in school. Definitely true Probably true Not sure Probably not true Definitely not true 9. My family, neighbors, and friends talked often about making our lives better. Definitely true Probably true Not sure Probably not true Definitely not true 10. We had rules in our house and were expected to keep them. Definitely true Probably true Not sure Probably not true Definitely not true 11. When I felt really bad, I could almost always find someone I trusted to talk to. Definitely true Probably true Not sure Probably not true Definitely not true 12. When I was a youth, people noticed that I was capable and could get things done. Definitely true Probably true Not sure Probably not true Definitely not true 13. I was independent and a go-getter. Definitely true Probably true Not sure Probably not true Definitely not true 14. I believed that life is what you make it. Definitely true Probably true Not sure Probably not true Definitely not true How many of these fourteen protective factors did I have as a child and youth? (How many of the fourteen were circled “Definitely True” or “Probably True”?) _______ Of these circled, how many are still true for me?”
― Donna Jackson Nakazawa, Childhood Disrupted: How Your Biography Becomes Your Biology, and How You Can Heal

“Recognizing that chronic childhood stress leads to chronic adult illness and relationship challenges can be enormously freeing. If you have been wondering why you’ve been struggling a little too hard for a little too long with your emotional and physical well-being—feeling as if you’ve been swimming against some invisible current that never ceases—this aha can come as a welcome relief. Finally, you can see the current. And you see how it’s been working steadily against you all of your life.”
― Donna Jackson Nakazawa, Childhood Disrupted: How Your Biography Becomes Your Biology, and How You Can Heal

“It makes sense that people who repeatedly make poor decisions in choosing partners and have troubled relationships keep repeating their mistakes. Their motivations are as biological as they are emotional. The woman who can’t stop blaming her husband for every small infraction, the man who can’t stop trying to control his wife: their brains didn’t receive the love needed to foster the critical neural interconnections that create secure, loving attachment. They keep bumping up against the same neurobiological deficits, over and over again.”
― Donna Jackson Nakazawa, Childhood Disrupted: How Your Biography Becomes Your Biology, and How You Can Heal

“There is a saying that you learn how to love others through the love others show you—but what if no one showed you how? Recent findings from interpersonal biology show that early losses and chronic unpredictable stress alter the neurocircuitry of the young brain in ways that dramatically change our later ability to create and nurture successful, meaningful relationships.”
― Donna Jackson Nakazawa, Childhood Disrupted: How Your Biography Becomes Your Biology, and How You Can Heal

“Imagine for a moment that your body receives its stress hormones and chemicals through an IV drip that’s turned on high when needed, and when the crisis passes, it’s switched off again. Now think of it this way: kids whose brains have undergone epigenetic changes because of early adversity have an inflammation-promoting drip of fight-or-flight hormones turned on high every day—and there is no off switch.”
― Donna Jackson Nakazawa, Childhood Disrupted: How Your Biography Becomes Your Biology, and How You Can Heal

“Our brains construct a world that no one else can see, touch, or hear. Or, as Buddhist teachers sometimes say, “The truth is a pathless land.”
― Donna Jackson Nakazawa, Childhood Disrupted: How Your Biography Becomes Your Biology, and How You Can Heal

“When we are able to reframe stress in our minds, and recognize that feeling anxious can actually be a useful reaction, we lessen the harmful long-term effects of stress itself. When you understand that your “pounding heart is preparing you for action,” says McGonigal, and the fact that you’re breathing harder is a sign that oxygen is pumping into the brain in order to help you think faster, you realize that the “stress response is helpful for your performance; it’s helping you to rise to a challenge.” With that recognition, your stress response becomes far less physiologically damaging to your body. Tightened blood and heart vessels relax, the body relaxes—and yet you retain the benefits of the stress response: a heightened awareness.”
― Donna Jackson Nakazawa, Childhood Disrupted: How Your Biography Becomes Your Biology, and How You Can Heal

“Still, the Sensitivity Gene brings with it distinct neurobiological pluses. The same plasticity of the brain that makes sensitive children highly reactive to stress also makes them more intuitive and receptive, more easily shaped by what is good and healthy in their environment, too: the support they’re shown, the loving relationships they experience, the caring mentor who sees something special in them and takes them under his or her wing. Even later efforts in adulthood to reshape and rehabilitate their own brains may bring them greater healing results.”
― Donna Jackson Nakazawa, Childhood Disrupted: How Your Biography Becomes Your Biology, and How You Can Heal

“This is the new psychosocial theory of everything: our early emotional stories determine the body and brain’s operating system and how well they will be able to guard our optimal physical and emotional health all of our adult lives.”
― Donna Jackson Nakazawa, Childhood Disrupted: How Your Biography Becomes Your Biology, and How You Can Heal

“In other words, Kat has a very high ACE Score of 5. And yet if you had met Kat at twenty or thirty, it’s unlikely that you would have recognized the link between her childhood trauma and the many adult health—and life—hurdles that would later challenge her.”
― Donna Jackson Nakazawa, Childhood Disrupted: How Your Biography Becomes Your Biology, and How You Can Heal

“For the rest of Kat’s childhood, she moved from one relative’s house to another’s, up and down the East Coast, living in four homes before entering high school. Finally, in high school, she lived for a few years with her grandmother, her mom’s mom, whom she called “G-Ma.” No one ever talked about her mom’s murder. “In my family, my past was ‘The Big Unmentionable’—including my role in putting my own father in jail,” she says. In high school, Kat appeared to be doing well. She was an honor student who played four varsity sports. Beneath the surface, however, “I was secretly self-medicating with alcohol because otherwise, by the time everything stopped and it got quiet at night, I could not sleep, I would just lie there and a terrible panic would overtake me.” She went to college, failed out, went back, and graduated. She went to work in advertising, and one day, dissatisfied, quit. She went back to grad school, piling up debt. She became a teacher. Kat quit that job too, when a relationship she had formed with another teacher imploded. At the age of thirty-four, Kat went to stay with her brother and his family in Hawaii. She got a job as a valet, parking cars. “I’d come home from parking cars all day and curl up on my bed in the back bedroom of my brother’s house, and lie there feeling desperate and alone, my heart beating with anxiety.”
― Donna Jackson Nakazawa, Childhood Disrupted: How Your Biography Becomes Your Biology, and How You Can Heal

“Or, as Bernie Siegel, MD, puts it, quite simply, after half a century of practicing medicine, “I have become convinced that our number-one public health problem is our childhood.” The”
― Donna Jackson Nakazawa, Childhood Disrupted: How Your Biography Becomes Your Biology, and How You Can Heal

“Ultimately, when you embrace the process of healing despite your Adverse Childhood Experiences, you don’t just become who you might have been if you hadn’t encountered so much childhood suffering in the first place. You gain something better: the hard-earned gift of life wisdom, which you bring forward into every arena of your life.”
― Donna Jackson Nakazawa, Childhood Disrupted: How Your Biography Becomes Your Biology, and How You Can Heal

“Dan Siegel, MD, it can help to remember the basic S’s of attachment. Let your child be seen, be safe, be soothed, and feel secure. Seen. Helping our kids to feel seen means perceiving who they are deeply, empathetically. You sense your child’s mind beneath her behavior, offer your understanding, and reflect back to her the innate goodness that you see in her. When your child feels as if you see her for who she really is, that you hear and listen to what she thinks and how she feels, that allows her to develop a stronger, more secure attachment. It leads to resilience. Safe. Avoid actions, reactions, and responses that frighten or hurt your children. Soothed. Help your children to deal with their difficult emotions and fears. When they encounter fearful or stressful situations, be there for them, with open arms. You are their safe harbor. Secure. Help your children to develop an internalized sense of well-being by making sure that they know they are safe in the world.”
― Donna Jackson Nakazawa, Childhood Disrupted: How Your Biography Becomes Your Biology, and How You Can Heal

“Lanius helps patients who have experienced trauma in their youth to be aware of their feelings again—often for the first time (we’ll read more about that in Chapter Seven). “Many of them have never felt positive emotions—they have a complete inability to experience positive feelings, and when they do feel something positive, they’re immediately flooded with negative emotions,” she says. This is borne out by a study that found that kids who lost a parent early in life didn’t necessarily have more negative moods than other people did—they simply had fewer positive moods. Investigators showed study participants forty mood words. People who lost a parent early in life experienced the negative words as negative, but, according to brain-wave measurements, they also experienced the positive words they saw (“loving, warm-hearted, affectionate, pleased, happy, enthusiastic”) as negative. Other research shows that kids who lost a parent at an early age later experience low self-esteem, loneliness, isolation, and an inability to express feelings—even seventy-one years after losing their parent.”
― Donna Jackson Nakazawa, Childhood Disrupted: How Your Biography Becomes Your Biology, and How You Can Heal

“When I broke my collarbone at summer camp when I was eleven, I didn’t tell them; it never occurred to me that I had parents who could protect me from pain and suffering,” she says. “I lived with the pain. When I returned home at the end of the summer, a family friend saw the lump on my chest and told me I had to tell my mother. My mother took me to the doctor. He said it was a case of gross negligence.” But Priscilla didn’t resent her parents when she was growing up. “I felt like I was the ‘hero child’; I was saving my mom. She was so complimentary, and wanted to be so close to me, I assumed that must be a good thing.” It was only as Priscilla came into her teen years that “I began to realize that my”
― Donna Jackson Nakazawa, Childhood Disrupted: How Your Biography Becomes Your Biology, and How You Can Heal

“But most kids are never asked. Kat went from the age of five to thirty-five without anyone ever asking her what had happened in her early life. Her past was always “The Big Unmentionable.” As a result, she felt “deep-seated shame.” Wherever she went, she says, “I carried so much unspoken guilt about what my father had done and about my having said the words that sent my own dad to jail. My family almost never talked about my mom’s murder. It was as if none of it had ever happened.”
― Donna Jackson Nakazawa, Childhood Disrupted: How Your Biography Becomes Your Biology, and How You Can Heal

“This is the new psychosocial theory of everything: our early emotional stories determine the body and brain’s operating system and how well they will be able to guard our optimal physical and emotional health all of our adult lives. We”
― Donna Jackson Nakazawa, Childhood Disrupted: How Your Biography Becomes Your Biology, and How You Can Heal

“That’s when Kat realized that “I had let go of my pain, my story of loss, my victimhood, the grief and fear and sense of failure and shame and guilt from so much abandonment. I had to say good-bye to all the negative emotions that I had embodied over the years. Because when I let go, I was greeted by a new, deeper layer of wholeness, a sense of inner freedom.”
― Donna Jackson Nakazawa, Childhood Disrupted: How Your Biography Becomes Your Biology, and How You Can Heal

“Most psychologists agree that a child has to develop a secure attachment with at least one primary caregiver in order to learn how to effectively regulate her own emotions for the rest of her life, and in order to learn how to become attached in a healthy way in adult relationships.”
― Donna Jackson Nakazawa, Childhood Disrupted: How Your Biography Becomes Your Biology, and How You Can Heal

“kids whose brains have undergone epigenetic changes because of early adversity have an inflammation-pro-mot- drip of fight-or-flight hormones turned on high every day—and there is no off switch.”
― Donna Jackson Nakazawa, Childhood Disrupted: How Your Biography Becomes Your Biology, and How You Can Heal

“a person with an ACE Score of 4 or more is, statistically, 1,220 percent more likely to attempt suicide than someone with an ACE Score of 0.”
― Donna Jackson Nakazawa, Childhood Disrupted: How Your Biography Becomes Your Biology, and How You Can Heal

“When the HPA stress axis is overloaded in childhood or the teenage years, it leads to long-lasting side effects—not just because of the impact stress has on us at that time in our lives, but also because early chronic stress biologically reprograms how we will react to stressful events for our entire lives. That”
― Donna Jackson Nakazawa, Childhood Disrupted: How Your Biography Becomes Your Biology, and How You Can Heal

“Adults who faced early life stress show greater erosion in what’s known as telomeres—which are protective caps that sit on the ends of strands of DNA to keep DNA healthy and intact. As telomeres erode, we’re more likely to develop disease, and we age faster. As our telomeres age and expire, our cells expire, and eventually, so do we.”
― Donna Jackson Nakazawa, Childhood Disrupted: How Your Biography Becomes Your Biology, and How You Can Heal