Page 7 - The First 60 Days Magazine

NURTURING

CONNECTIONS IN

THE FIRST TWO MONTHS

An exert from the article:

“What Happened to You?” by Bruce Perry and Oprah Winfrey:
a book that resonates with us in the PACEs world. By Carey Sipp, PACES Connection Staff.

First two months of life are critical

Which leads me to a couple of many profound moments in the book. First, about developmental trauma and the
importance of the first two months of life, of mothers and babies developing a secure attachment.
Perry writes, “The basic finding is that the experiences of the first two months of life have a disproportionately
important impact on your long-term health and development. This has to do with the remarkably rapid growth of
the brain early in life, and the organization of those all-important core regulatory networks.
“If, in the first two months of life, a child experienced high adversity with minimal relational buffering but was then
put into a healthier environment for the next twelve years, their outcomes were worse than the outcomes of
children who had low adversity and healthy relational connection in the first two months but then spent the next
twelve years with high adversity.
“Think of that: The child who has only two months of really bad experiences does worse than the child with almost
twelve years of bad experiences, all because of the timing of the experiences.
“This sounds discouraging. But we believe that poor outcomes are not inevitable; in fact, we believe that this is a
perfect example of why we need developmentally informed, trauma-aware systems.”
Perry invites readers to think back to conversations about how important attentive, responsive caregiving is in
providing the organizing experiences for the infant’s stress-response systems.
“Remember that if the life experiences of the first two months include inconsistent or unpredictable stress, this
pattern of activation creates a sensitized stress response. That leads to a cascade of problems—trauma related
problems. And even when these children are no longer in high-risk settings, their problems have to be addressed
by caregivers, pediatricians, mental health providers, and educators. But if these people misunderstand what’s
going on, if these systems focus on “What is wrong with you?”—as unfortunately, they typically do—the children
won’t get better. They will continue to struggle. Their emotional reactivity and behavior problems will be viewed
without a developmental or trauma lens, which could lead to ineffective interventions.”
Source: PACES Connection

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