Adverse Childhood Experiences

I stumbled upon this term while researching theories on childhood obesity.

As it happens it's the name of a study, conducted by Kaiser Foundation, identifying a series of adverse childhood experiences and their correlation to behavior, and even more fascinating that these effects lasted decades into the subjects' lives and in extreme cases, impacting health and wellbeing. They found that when a person has 6 or more of these adverse effects in their life before the age of 18, that can be correlated to a shortened life span - 60 years average instead of the average of 79 for other study participants.

Many people are going to have one or two with no long term effect. It's the cumulative score that seems to set up the pattern.

The events are:
1. Emotional abuse
2. Physical abuse
3. Sexual abuse
4. Emotional neglect
5. Physical neglect
6. Seeing your mother treated violently
7. Someone in the household an alcoholic or substance abuser
9. Someone in the household with mental illness
10. Living with only 1 parent
11. Someone in the household in jail

Most of us probably recognize this as fitting the definition of PTSD, and it does. What's so fascinating is that it's applied to early trauma, and can cause a lifetime of emotional instability, poor choices, habbits, etc. These people have higher incidences of childhood onset of obesity, alcoholism, smoking, depression... the list is long and you can look it up if you're interested.

I have 6 of them, which shocked me. I knew my childhood was pretty effed up but I wasn't expecting to score that many.

I feel pretty lucky in that even though I was once on the wrong path, I rarely drink, haven't smoked in nearly 30 years, etc. so I don't have a lifetime of those behaviors contributing to my prognosis. And I feel very... excited is probably the wrong word - it's more a combination of aha and relief. Just to have a name for the thing that has hung over my life for so long, is incredibly freeing.

But I digress, as I wished to limit the topic of my question to childhood obesity only and I'll probably go back and delete part of the above a bit later. I was in my first drunk driving accident at 7 (at a normal weight), and started my first Weigh****chers diet a year later, at 8. [No, I wasn't the drunk driving the car! :) ] Coincidence? I used to think so.

So anyway, does anybody else whose obesity began in childhood recognize any of these adverse events in their life?

Whether your answer is yes or no, to what do you attribute your struggles with weight?

Wow.  My father was a working alcoholic.  He had 7 business going when he died at 49 of a heart attack, his 3rd, I think.  Other than that, my family was about as normal as any I have ever know of and I don't think I am being blind to issues.

I was a premiee and I remember Mother saying she had to put gerber meats in my bottle.  I have always blamed that on my meat addition.  We were a clean plate family but ate a good balanced diet.  Of course when I was young, eating out was such a luxury and there certainly wasn't such a thing as fast food.  We didn't have lots of sweets in the house ever.

I think mainly, although I ate a healthy diet, I ate too much.  My DH is 6'4" and I think I tried to keep up with him.  I was chubby off and on and dieted as a teenager but was never even obese until after having the children.

Yours sounds pretty normal to me, except the meat in the bottle. That's kind of funny. I think most people have one or two on the list and that's perfectly normal.

Thanks for your response.

I think mine is more tied into physical and emotional issues in the way my family dealt with my celiac. Celiac can also contribute to weight gain in adult years, as crazy as that sounds. Then of course there's genetics.

--g

celiac disease. Yuck. Yes, genetics has to play a big part in weight, right?

Interesting study. I do think that for some of us, our childhood is connected to our obesity or using food inappropriately. I know for me it was....I used food to cope and to self medicate. As Gina said though, this is not true for others. Self awareness, support, therapy, etc though can help you as you grow and hopefully heal. Six on the list means you are a survivor.

Blessings,

Jennifer

It is interesting. I think I fall into the using food to cope and self medicate too. No real way to know if there's truly a causal relationship there, it's just kind of an interesting large cohort study.

With 6, you can probably imagine I already have a therapist. haha. We actually talked about this study this week. It's really helpful to have her and this data adds a layer of depth to issues we've been working through. I'm just finally getting to the point where I can start to believe it's not all my fault, so this is not just interesting but helpful to see there are indeed forces at work outside ourselves that we don't really register.

Thanks for your reply

I have two on the list,emotional abuse and a sister with mental issues,hence the emotional abuse.

I think I ate to medicate from her,plus my mom had a huge sweet tooth and there was ALWAYS scads of sweets in the house.

I believe I became addicted to sugar very early in life and it has been a life long addiction. I am still adicted to it to this day.

I was always overweight as long as I can remember.

Oops. Didn't mean to quote. Editing to remove quote. I hate it when people quote!

I completely relate to that. Lots of sweets in the house. Food as reward and comfort.

Thanks so much for your reply.

I guess this list is hard for me because, for me, things aren't really black and white.  I mean, what I considered emotional abuse, my sister feels was just my parents showing "tough love".  Physical abuse wasn't daily but there was a few times my mother bloodied my nose.  I had my share of pedophiles cross my path but in comparing notes it seems like almost every female I have spoken with has had some creepy guy try to feel them up.  Emotional and physical neglect are pretty clear.  Never saw my mother treated violently.  No active drinkers in my family but my mother was a compulsive gambler.  My dad appeared to be drinking too much at one point but he just decided to stop drinking and that was it.  Same with the smoking.  The mental illness in my family is pretty cut and dried, although some of them were never officially diagnosed or not diagnosed until they were adults.  I lived with both parents until I was 13 so does that count?  As far as I know, I was the only person in the household who has been to jail :)
I went through all the childhood work years ago and as I've gotten older I've gotten over it.  I was only a child for 18 years for God's sake.  I had a lot more experiences after my parents were done with me and I had to learn to accept that they did the best they could with what they had at the time and I need to take personal responsibility for my own behaviors.  Yes, I had ****ty parents.  But I was a ****ty kid, too.  Thank God none of my kids were as bad as I was.  I might have snapped, too.  My second daughter was close and it really learned a lot from that experience.  God help me if she ever told her story, which I am sure she has.  Her version of her childhood might make mine look like a trip to Disneyland.  It's all in perception.
I hope to God my kids never trash me the way I've trashed my mother.  I am grateful that are more forgiving towards me then I was towards my mother.  I blamed her for everything in my life for years until I learned to just get over it and stop blaming and start taking responsibility for myself.
As far as childhood obesity my opinion may differ from others but I believe that genetics play more of a role then has been given credit.  I can only base this on my own kids.  I have 5 of them and I raised them the same, feed them the same, ate the same with all of them.  Only one of them has a problem with food.  The others have struggled with a few pounds here or there but my youngest mirrors me as far as using food as her drug.  I saw this growing up with my best friend.  She was morbidly obese from childhood, yet the rest of her family was not.  Then I found out that her and her brother were adopted.  She told me that she met her birth mother once and that she was morbidly obese, too.  Her adopted brother was thin but they were raised by the same people, at the same food, etc.
I'm not saying that there are other factors in play, especially now with all the electronics available.  I am sure that kids are less active then when I was a kid.  I am sure there is more junk food available to kids then there used to be.  And I am sure it all contributes.  But I also think that the predisposition to overeat for emotional reasons is genetic, the same as the tendency to be an alcoholic or addict.  There are some who have abused alcohol or drugs without being an addict.