Adverse Childhood Experiences and How They Impact 'Today'

Story by V. Michelle Bernard and Tompaul Wheeler

Many people’s lives are shaped by what psychologists call Adverse Childhood Experiences. The list includes neglect, physical and sexual abuse, poverty and instability in the home, and family dysfunction. Such experiences can shape people’s entire lives—how they form relationships, how they react to stress, how they relate to careers and their professional lives and much more. 

“The way that children create bonds with their caregivers is a huge piece to how those children begin to navigate life experiences,” says Walleska Bliss, a psychologist and member of Chesapeake Conference’s Middletown (Md.) church. “Individuals who have positive, secure attachments to their primary caregiver will tend to have more confidence and more positive relational experiences and coping experiences as adults. 

“Childhood experiences contribute to the way that human beings either adapt or are able to navigate and journey through the remaining chapters of life. Adults will either resort to healthy and positive lifestyle behaviors or to maladaptive, unhealthy, coping behaviors and lifestyles.” 

The search for security can drive people into all manner of risky behavior, from self-harm to drug addiction to violence. “We all grow up—how have we been shaped on the inside?” Bliss reflects. “And then, we all start interacting with other imperfectly formed people.” 

Bliss points to the security that can only be found in Christ, as well as the power of Christian community. “People who feel associated or welcome in different social groups tend to have a more positive perspective about themselves in life,” she says. “Sharing in common beliefs, sharing in mission-minded goals, service opportunities, all of those are different ways to be able to instill and cultivate that sense of belonging and connectedness, which will absolutely override the sense of past failures or maladaptive lifestyle coping strategies that individuals have resorted to.”