- [Narrator] Hey there, Psych2goers.
Welcome back to another video.
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Let's begin.
Have you ever felt that your past experiences have
negatively affected your current state of being?
Your childhood plays a major role in shaping the person you
become as you grow older.
Adverse childhood experiences,
or ACEs for short, are traumatic events
that occur before the age of 18.
If you experienced ACEs,
you may suffer from poor physical and mental health
and emotional trauma.
According to the National Survey of Children's Health,
over 61% of adults in the United States
reportedly experienced at least one type of ACE,
while approximately one in every six people experienced
as many as four or more.
With that said,
here are the seven most common kinds
of childhood trauma or ACEs.
One, abuse.
Whether it's physical, emotional,
or sexual in nature,
abuse takes a serious toll on your mental health and is by
far the most harmful of all adverse childhood experiences.
Being abused or watching a parent or sibling being abused,
especially at a young age can lead to a number of serious
often long-term psychological consequences.
It gives you a negative outlook on life,
damages your self-esteem and leaves
you struggling with constant feelings of loneliness,
emptiness, and hopelessness,
even as you grow older.
According to a study conducted by Teicher and Anderson,
child abuse and domestic violence also puts you
at higher risk of developing clinical depression, PTSD,
and tendencies of self-harm and suicidal behavior.
Statistics also show that approximately 30 to 40%
of children who were victims of abuse
grew up to become abusers later on in their lives too.
Two, neglect.
An equally dangerous and traumatizing
kind of ACE is neglect.
An often overlooked form of abuse.
Neglect is defined by researcher, Dr. Glasser,
as a deficit in meeting a child's basic needs.
Child neglect refers to parents failure to provide adequate
food, clothing, shelter, educational, emotional support,
and medical care to their children.
Some of the most common examples of child neglect
include the following.
Abandonment, irresponsible supervision,
severe punishment, such as starving a child,
or threatening them with violence,
and emotional neglect, such as dismissive behavior,
being unsupportive, or being absent
at important life events.
If you're a victim of child neglect,
you may find that you have difficulty forming healthy and
stable relationships as you grow older,
or maybe you're already experiencing this issue now.
Check out our video,
"How Your Childhood Affects Your Love Styles"
to learn more about the impact
of early childhood experiences
shaping your adult relationships.
Number three, mental health issues.
Mental health issues considered to be adverse
childhood experiences, mainly refer
to the mental illness of a parent,
and how it can negatively affect a child's life.
According to the Yale Medicine Child Study Center,
over 15 million children in the United States
live with a parent
who has been diagnosed with severe depression.
Because depression compromises parental bonding
and nurturing, depressed parents have been found
to interact with their children in ways
that seriously impair their development.
They tend to be less supportive
and less affectionate with their children.
And as a result may severely neglect your emotional needs
and cause you to grow up to be emotionally stunted.
Number four, risky behaviors.
Risky behaviors are defined as any potentially health
or life-threatening behaviors that endanger the safety
and wellbeing of both the parent and their child.
The most common kinds of risky behaviors are alcohol abuse
and substance abuse.
Because children are so susceptible to
the examples and influences of their parents,
it's no surprise that if you have an alcoholic or drug
dependent parent, you're more likely to develop substance
abuse problems of your own in the future.
You're also more likely to struggle with feelings of shame,
guilt and isolation,
suffer from lack of attention,
have a fear of anger,
and conflict and suffer from depression or anxiety.
Number five, serious injury.
Have you ever been in an accident or gotten hurt badly?
Do you have childhood injuries that still haunt
you even to this day?
Car accidents, falls, explosions, animal bites,
and other kinds of accidents are incredibly distressing
experiences to go through.
And the injuries you get from them can be irreparable.
Fractures, burns, the loss of a limb, brain damage,
and the loss of major senses, such as hearing or sight
are all examples of adverse childhood experiences.
Number six, serious illness.
Aside from injuries and accidents,
being diagnosed with a serious illness can be considered a
traumatic childhood experience as well.
If you're a child who has battled deadly
or infectious illnesses, such as cancer,
heart problems, and malaria,
you may have often felt isolated from your peers,
because you spent so much of your time being treated
at hospitals or clinics.
According to a study conducted by Schilling,
Aseltine and Gore, the severity of your symptoms
might also restrict your lifestyle and keep you
from doing the things that you want,
while your parents may suddenly become
more controlling and protective.
And number seven, problems at school.
Lastly, but not least,
adverse childhood experiences
don't only take place at home.
Many school related problems can also be traumatizing for
children at a young age, especially bullying.
Because a child lacks the emotional maturity
to understand that it's not their fault for falling
victim to bullying,
most of them internalize the experiences,
and you may have wrongly come to believe
that you somehow deserved it.
It warps your view of others and of yourself
and leaves you struggling with feelings of loneliness,
helplessness, depression, and anxiety.
The emotional and psychological scars carved into you by
your childhood can be so deep
that they stay with you well into adulthood.
Acknowledging your pain and understanding your trauma
is the first step into the journey of healing from it.
By learning to accept your past,
no matter how terrible it may have been,
you're making a conscious effort to move on
and keep it from defining your future.
Have you experienced any of these traumatic events
when you were a child?
Are you still struggling to get over it?
Reach out to a mental health care professional today
and get the help you need.
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