“It all Happens in your Childhood” - A Counselling Psychologist’s Opinion

            As I have entered into the stage of ‘the mother’ in my womanhood over the past year, my world has changed completely. Only in the past couple of years have I truly felt like an adult and embodied my adulthood. So, as I have emerged from adolescence and a more youthful mindset, I have also become a parent to my first-born child. I am in a unique position by currently being a student on the Doctor of Counselling Psychology course who has undertaken a decade of psychology courses. The many psychological theories I have learned are now intertwined with my mind and how I view the world. The notion that everything that impacts who we are, and our overall psychic development starts in our childhood is a generalization based on a plethora of theories. My position is that childhood is our base and provides us with the foundational learning we need in order to become functioning human beings, and that the lessons and experiences we each have as children stay with us.

In the same way that a tree is grounded by its roots which must grow down first to provide the base for all that the tree will become, our childhood is the roots that must grow to support all that we will become. The tools that we develop in childhood are what allow us to navigate the adult space we one day come into. Children are impressionable. They are wandering our Earth not knowing or fully understanding truths that we grow to understand with age. It is a child’s role to grow and learn and in order for them to do that, they use their senses. They watch our behaviour and they mimic it, they listen to what we say and repeat it, they taste something to understand it, smell something and go towards or away from it, and they feel something cozy and cuddle up to it. They are sensory creatures, innocent and almost primitive. Watching my son grow over the past year has felt like looking into an infinity mirror effect where each layer of reflection is the mother, father and child that came before. I have gained new understanding of my parents and what they must have done for me as an infant and what I know they did for me as a child/adolescent, and how it’s shaped the person I have become.

I do not believe that “it all happens in your childhood” but rather, our childhood is a pivotal time with a lasting impact. What we’ve gained from theorists such as Sigmund Freud, Melanie Klien, Albert Bandura, Harry Harlow, and so on, is that children form attachments to their primary caregivers, prefer comfort over food, and learn through modelling behaviours they see adult's display. These theories (very much simplified) suggest how impressionable children are and how important connection, security and comfort from care givers is in the early stages of life. Kleinian theory has been a staple in the Dpsych training and in lieu of this, feels interlinked with the language, understanding and implementation of therapy. From the moment we are conceived we begin to learn, and when we are born, we begin to learn rapidly. Our parents, or primary caregivers, tend to our every need and teach us about ourselves, life and the world around us and we learn from our own observations and experimentation.

Through my clinical practice, I have been privy to how childhood impacts upon an individual. My clients often refer to elements of their upbringing that they feel have influenced who they are. Listening to their stories and gaining an understanding of the experiences they have had during childhood, I too can link some thoughts, beliefs, emotions and behaviours to that period of their life. In my recent placement I have had several clients who self-proclaim that they struggle with anxiety. Interestingly; but perhaps not coincidentally, each of these clients has experienced some level of emotional neglect from their parents. They struggle to believe in themselves, and each has stated that they sometimes feel that they ‘are not good enough’. 

As counselling psychologists, we aim to be integrative practitioners, meaning that we practice from more than one modality and allow a wider range of theories to influence our formulation and understanding of our clients. When I am sat with my clients and the content they bring, I am seeking to explore the whole picture. The social, political, biological and systemic elements that impact them in their daily lives are also a part of the formulation and the mental health difficulties they are experiencing. Additionally, there may be trauma in their past and whether that trauma is old or new it often carries a lasting impact. 

When I think back on my own childhood, I immediately think about my older sister. She and I are only one year and five months apart and while we were growing up, she was always one grade above me in school. Attending school was an integral part of my upbringing, as it is for most children born into western societies. She and I were probably two of twenty Black children in our elementary school. In middle school this number doubled, but by high school there were never more than fifty Black kids in the entire school. Our foundation was two strong-minded and strong-willed parents who wanted the best for us. They wanted us to have a better life than themselves and they did very well to achieve that. 

My dad is a confident, charismatic, entrepreneurial man and my mom is a beautiful, intelligent, loyal and organized woman. The two of them instilled much of themselves into us and guided us through each stage of our lives with attentiveness and care. They educated us from a young age that we would have to work harder and be better due to being Black. They always made us feel beautiful and reminded us of this even when we did not feel it ourselves and society would have us believe otherwise. They rewarded us for good behaviour and punished us for bad. They prepared us for school, prepared us for puberty, prepared us for adulthood and the rest of our lives. They were always warm and loving, and still are. 

Despite the way my parents raised us and the many similarities my sister and I share, we have grown up to be very different in how we navigate the world. I have always been career-driven and confident, while she has struggled with low self-esteem and anxiety, and is still unsure about her career path. Our career goals have always been different and for some reason my parents have always believed in me wholeheartedly, while with my artsy sister, they have been more hesitant to believe in her goals. Both my sister and I were bullied at times in school simply because we were Black, but she received additional bullying when we were younger for being slightly overweight. I resented being bullied in elementary school, so I became the bully myself when I was in middle school, while my sister took a quieter approach and just kept the peace and kept people laughing. 

My sister and I have been taught the same lessons by our parents and have essentially been given the same basis, yet we still have key differences and lead entirely different lives as adults. The experiences we had as children and lessons we were taught can only go so far. The world has its way of getting in. There is nature and there is nurture and as a counselling psychologist, I believe it is vital to explore the multitude of things that create the client's current presentation, both past and present.

I would argue that some people who hear the statement “it all happens in your childhood” will treat it as if it is synonymous with “you are a shitty parent and you fucked up your kids.” It is a statement that undoubtably raises anxiety in many parents or soon-to-be-parents in the world. With their anxieties raised, it is likely their defenses are too. Individual therapy is limited because it is the client who is doing the work on themselves while those around them remain the same. I have a client who describes their dad as being old-school, misogynistic, homophobic, and emotionally unintelligent, and their mom as needy, ignorant, unreliable, and also lacking in emotional intelligence. This client is angry. She has tried to have conversations with both of her parents regarding her upbringing, their current relationship, and her sibling dynamics, but she has been met with defenses from them both. 

Her parents' defenses carry on the family dynamics she is used to. As a result of this, it is not just her childhood and ‘the past’ that is impacting her mental health, but it is also the present continuation of the same behaviour. Some clients will not say anything to their parents, they remain afraid of them and infantilized by them, and so systematically – the patterns and roles remain the same and what has happened in childhood may repeat itself in adulthood. 

The vulnerability, mental and physical immaturity of children makes them susceptible. As a mother, I will do anything in my power to protect my child. As a daughter, I feel I have been protected to the best of my parents' abilities. As a sister, I see that our parents cannot protect us from everything. And as a psychologist, I know our childhood is the first stage in our learning process. If you tear down a building, you will be left with the foundation. If you cut down a tree, you will be left with the stump and the roots. Our childhood is undeniably apart of us forever, but if that base isn’t strong – then strength can be added. As counselling psychologists, with our understanding of development and psychotherapy we know that behaviour can be unlearned, security and love can be found, trauma can be processed, and people can be forgiven so that growth may take place and we are positioned to assist with it all.