Boy_Who_Was_Raised_as_a_Dog

The Boy Who Was Raised as a Dog was written by Bruce D. Perry--with some writing help from Maia Szalavitz. Bruce Perry MD, PhD, is a child psychiatrist who has worked for the FBI as a consultant, Chief of Psychiatry at Texas Children's Hospital, and at Baylor College of Medicine. He is now the Senior Fellow of the Child Trauma Academy. In every job he has worked to help each child overcome whatever damage had been psychologically induced to their brains. Through each case he learned more and more to understand how a child's brain reacts and develops differently due to trauma early in life. This book is written documentation of some of his most challenging cases. Maia Szalavitz worked to help Dr. Perry get his life's work down on paper. She specifically writes in the health and science categories. The brain stem is at the bottom of the brain and is the first piece to develop. It is in charge of unconscious actions such as your heartbeat and breathing (DVD). It develops at a very young age so the first few years of life are crucial to brain development. The base of the brainstem is the medulla. The medulla controls your heartbeat and breathing. The top of the brainstem is the thalamus. It delivers messages to the areas in your cortex that deal with your five senses. It also delivers messages from the cortex to the cerebellum and medulla, so it’s also like a mailman. The reticular formation is the part of the cortex that controls arousal, or when you sleep and wake up. The back of the brain stem is the cerebellum. It processes sensory information and then decides what movements your body will make. The limbic system controls your behaviors and actions. The amygdala is two almond shaped neural clusters in the limbic system. They help control your emotions. The hippocampus is the cause for us to have memories. It is like the key to our memories. The pituitary gland controls how fast you grow and other glands in the endocrine system. The hypothalamus, which is below the thalamus, helps direct eating, drinking, and keeping a stable body temperature. It also governs the endocrine system and helps the amygdala control emotion. The prefrontal cortex is the very front of the frontal lobe. The frontal lobe is in charge of conscious rational thought. It plans complicated thinking behaviors, expresses your personality, helps make decisions and makes sure your social behavior is correct. When exposed to a stressful, possibly dangerous situation, information travels first to the amygdala before it can get to your frontal lobe. Therefore, we freeze first in fear and then think about how to react to the situation. (DVD) The cerebral cortex is located along the outside of the brain. It is the intertwined fabric of neural cells that cover the cerebral hemispheres. It is our body's ultimate control and information processing center. The concept of nature vs. nurture is one that is evident throughout the entire novel. By definition from the text book nature vs. nurture is ”the long standing controversy over the relative contributions that genes and experience make to the development of psychological traits and behaviors.” (5) At many points Dr. Perry discusses the relevance of Nature vs. Nurture and how kids will react to different negative stimuli and traumatic events. Two boys named Leon and Connor exemplify both cases of genetics vs. environment being the most relevant factor in how humans develop and act. Both boys had seemingly loving, committed parents but unfortunately still experienced extreme cases of neglect early in life. Leon’s mother had some sort of mental limitations that caused her to not know what to do and how to raise her second born son once she was removed from her extended family. With her first son if she became overwhelmed, she passed the baby to a relative. With Leon she did not know what to do so she would leave him crying in his crib and leave the house for hours upon hours--almost always the entire day. Connor’s parents ran a successful business and soon after his birth they decided to leave him at home with a nanny who happened to be a cousin. All seemed well except for one fact hidden from his parents. The cousin was working another job and would just go to the house to change and feed him in the morning, at lunch and then would stay with him before his parents got home. This happened for a few months until the cousin was caught. Both boys had missed out on normal care. They would sit and cry with no one to soothe them—they missed out on having someone there to rock them and sing to them. The damage had been done so early in life that it had affected their most basic brain regions, the midbrain and brainstem. They both had deregulated stress response systems that caused them not to react to things in the way normal children would. Their lack of nurture had turned them into abnormally developed children. However nature, their specific genes, most likely made a difference in the severity of the actions made by each boy. While Connor became socially awkward, could not have normal relationships and walked with a limp, Leon became violent, angry and ultimately murdered, raped and brutalized two little girls. Boys in two very similar situations had two very different reactions and actions in life. While the lack of nurture had given them the original damage, nature took its course in how each boy reacted and handled the damage. Other examples of this combined effect of nature and nurture are found all throughout the novel. Tina’s environment of sexual abuse, Sandy’s witness of her mother’s murder, the Branch Davidian children’s environment growing up, Laura’s lack of physical affection, and Amber’s repeated rape were all parts of their environment (nurture) that caused their brain’s to develop differently (nature) and for them not to have normal responses to things. The question should not be whether nature or nurture works to alter children more, but how they work together to affect people. Even if we don't have kids of our own, each and every one of us interacts with at least one child a day whether it is a sibling, a neighbor, a mentored child, or just a random child at the grocery store. Understanding the lessons taught by Dr. Perry, the textbook, and the DVD can help us to be more conscientious of children and their parents. There are many situations in which we may be able to recognize signs of abuse or neglect in children just by observing them. If babysitting a child who is skittish to talk to you, there may have been prior abuse by a babysitter that has them on high alert at all times. In the locker room, seeing a girl with cuts and scars all up and down their arms can be a trigger that there has been a traumatic event in their life causing her to need to numb her systems with the release of natural opiates that comes with cutting. When mentoring a child, noticing their wide eyes watching your face carefully and having an aversion to physical closeness or contact can be signs of some abuse in their life. The situations are literally endless as to how this new knowledge can be helpful to understanding the children around us and to get them the help they need faster. While abused and neglected children are thankfully rarer than healthy, normal children, it is still good to be aware when there is abuse occurring and how to treat the abused. According to Dr. Perry, “What maltreated and traumatized children most need is a healthy community to buffer the pain, distress and loss caused by their earlier trauma.” (232). We need to learn how to create these communities and create a safe haven for all children.