Hating Your Home: Understanding Childhood Trauma

Childhood should be a time of safety, comfort, and trust—but for many children, home is anything but that. In his seminal work, The Body Keeps the Score, Bessel van der Kolk highlights the profound struggles faced by children growing up in environments where care and protection are absent:

“Children have no choice who their parents are, nor can they understand that parents may simply be too depressed, enraged, or spaced out to be there for them or that their parents’ behavior may have little to do with them. Children have no choice but to organize themselves to survive within the families they have. Unlike adults, they have no other authorities to turn to for help—their parents are the authorities. They cannot rent an apartment or move in with someone else: Their very survival hinges on their caregivers.”

This passage underscores a painful reality: children are trapped within the family structures they are born into. Their survival depends entirely on caregivers, regardless of whether those caregivers are nurturing or neglectful. Unlike adults, children cannot leave abusive environments or seek alternatives independently. Their entire worldview, emotional regulation, and sense of safety are shaped by those who are supposed to protect them.

Van der Kolk further explores how children manage trauma internally:

“Children sense—even if it they are not explicitly threatened—that if they talked about their beatings or molestation to teachers they would be punished. Instead, they focus their energy on not thinking about what has happened and not feeling the residues of terror and panic in their bodies. Because they cannot tolerate knowing what they have experienced, they also cannot understand that their anger, terror, or collapse has anything to do with that experience. They don’t talk; they act and deal with their feelings by being enraged, shut down, compliant, or defiant.”

Here, we see the profound impact of trauma on emotional processing. Children cannot simply articulate or rationalize their experiences—they respond through behavior. Enragement, withdrawal, compliance, or defiance are all ways that children navigate overwhelming fear and pain. Their bodies and minds are trying to survive in the moment, often leaving long-term psychological scars that persist into adulthood.

Van der Kolk also addresses a paradoxical truth about attachment:

“Children are also programmed to be fundamentally loyal to their caretakers, even if they are abused by them. Terror increases the need for attachment, even if the source of comfort is also the source of terror. I have never met a child below the age of ten who was tortured at home (and who had broken bones and burned skin to show for it) who, if given the option, would not have chosen to stay with his or her family rather than being placed in a foster home. Of course, clinging to one’s abuser is not exclusive to childhood.”

This loyalty, even in the face of abuse, is a survival mechanism. Children cling to familiar figures—even abusive ones—because attachment is essential for survival. It is a reminder that the human need for connection is so powerful that it can coexist with fear, pain, and trauma.

Understanding these dynamics is crucial. It helps us appreciate that behavioural patterns often labeled as “difficult” or “defiant” are often adaptive responses to environments that were unsafe. Recognising the ways trauma shapes attachment, emotional regulation, and behavior is the first step in providing effective therapeutic support.

Reference:

van der Kolk, B. (2014). The Body Keeps the Score: Brain, Mind, and Body in the Healing of Trauma. Penguin Books.