Personal Childhood Development Analysis In Ages Birth - 18

Human development is not something that happens overnight, it is a lifelong process that encompasses many aspects of biological, social, cognitive and emotional growth and change. There are many different theories that explain each part of a child’s development, but it is not until we put it all together that we have an overall understanding of how children develop. In this paper I reflect on my childhood development and will explore how each of these theories, life events, and turning points contributed to changes in my developmental trajectory. I will also discuss all aspects of Bronfenbrenner’s Ecological Systems Theory and how my surrounding environment as well as the theories listed above contributed to my development overall.

I do not remember much of my childhood due to a traumatic event which I talk about more towards the middle of my paper. Freud would say this is due to my “ego experiencing internal danger”. When the ego is threatened it defends itself by using a wide variety of defense mechanisms which are “aimed at repression”. When an impulse, idea, or event is repressed, the ego sends it back to the id’s unconscious where it cannot be accessed anymore. Due to this event I blocked out a lot of my childhood years including many years before and after the event. I am grateful for our powerful minds and know that my body will release the information to me if and when I am ready to know it. Even after years of therapy and EMDR my memories are still being locked up and I believe it is for a good reason. This was my way of surviving my early childhood years and my way of coping with the horrible things that I endured. The first level of Bronfenbrenner’s theory is the microsystem. This consists of the activities and interactions in the child’s immediate surroundings. This is the system that the individual has the most contact with and is in their direct environment. If a child is in a more nurturing and supportive environment they are set up for continuing to improve developmentally.

Growing up my microsystem consisted of family members, classmates, teachers, caregivers, and participation in dance and soccer. Each of these groups or individuals, and the interactions I had with them, played a huge role on how I grew up. Growing up I lived with immediate family including my grandma, grandpa, two uncles, and mom until the age of two. After that I lived with my mom and step-dad off and on, until the age of eleven when my mom, sister, and I moved back in with my grandma and uncle. This was after my mom learned of my two-year continuous sexual abuse and got a divorce from my step-dad. Despite this one negative event, there are many positive things that my mom and caretakers did to promote my health and development. My family made sure that I was eating a wide variety of foods and that we ate together at the table. I would go outside, play, and get exercise through dance classes, soccer, going to the park, swimming, and roller skating. My mom also made sure that I was going to the doctor and dentist for check-ups, even if she was not able to go herself. After my abuse she sought out therapy to also help tend to my emotional health. All these things contributed to my physical, social, cognitive and emotional development being typical of a child at my age. The concept of values was another thing that positively impacted my development. I have always been taught in life to be a good person. This means being trustworthy, honest, caring, and treating others how you would want to be treated. It is being reliable, dependable, following through with commitments, and living life responsibly. This is part of the macrosystem of Bronfenbrenner’s ecological model. It is composed of a child’s cultural patterns and values and contains the child’s most dominant beliefs and ideas. I always remember having a strong connection and attachment to my mom and grandma. Starting at birth I was never concerned with security needs. They always made sure that I was fed, cleaned, safe, and comfortable in all aspects of my life. Mary Ainsworth and her attachment theory would say that I was securely attached. I was not concerned with security needs as an infant and was therefore able to focus on other activities in my environment. My mom, grandma, and Rosemary, who I talk about next, were a few people that I could trust and count on no matter what. Erikson called this stage trust vs mistrust. This is the first part of a child’s psychosocial development where a child develops a sense of security and learns to trust caregivers. I learned early on who I could trust and who would be there for me to fulfill my basic needs.

Later on in my life I noticed myself regressing back to Erikson’s first stage of development. Around the age of six, my step-dad and grandpa came in and out of my life a lot. I could not count on them to be there when I needed them. Their presence was very inconsistent which led me to having trust issues later on in life, but only with certain people. I almost needed people to prove themselves to me before I could trust them and once the trust was broken it was extremely hard to get back. This is something I still struggle with today. Growing up my mom had an authoritative parenting style (Hutchinson, 2016). She would put a lot of effort into creating and maintaining a positive relationship with me and would make sure to explain the reason behind the rules. She would enforce the rules and give consequences but would always take my feelings into consideration when doing so. She would explain the whys behind her reasoning and for the most part, I would understand and listen to what she had to say. When I did do something that I was not supposed to do I would be put on a time out. What I was learning could be explained through Kohlberg’s theory of moral reasoning. Kohlberg believed that most moral development occurs through social interaction. The first level is the pre-conventional level. This is the stage when the child listens to the authoritarian figure to avoid punishment. The child focuses on the consequences and avoids doing other things that will put them in time out. Her explaining the why’s helped me through the conventional level as well. I was being taught the “right” way of behaving and what society views as normal. This would not only help me in my future relationships but allowed me to learn the acceptable way to act at school and in the world around us.

Due to my mom having a full-time job and my biological father being non-existent I found myself in need of day care. I attended day care from three months to two and a half years of age. A friend of my grandma’s referred my mom to a lady named Rosemary. My mom had a very positive relationship with Rosemary and I loved going to her house as well. This relationship can be explained through the second level of Bronfenbrenner’s theory which is the mesosystem. This consists of relationships among the people involved in the child’s microsystem. This can include the parents’ interactions with teachers and a school’s interactions with the daycare provider. It is the link between two or more settings and even though the child may not be directly involved, the relationship may still affect the child. Seeing the relationship between my mom and Rosemary helped model what a positive relationship between others should look like and how people are expected to treat one another. Although I was young I learned to remember and imitate observed behavior that I saw from my mom’s interactions with others through mental representation. This helped shape the way of how I would behave towards others for many years.

Rosemary always had the best interest of the children. She made us home cooked meals for breakfast and lunch and planned and set up a variety of activities on a daily basis. She would sing with us while allowing us to play with musical instruments and would let us go outside and ride tricycles to get our exercise while of course having fun. She would celebrate and go all out on our birthdays and hold annual Christmas parties for all the children and their families to get together and celebrate the holidays. Going to Rosemary’s as well as having the support from my family I was able to achieve many milestones. I learned gross motor skills such as crawling, sitting up, and standing up. I started walking at ten months, which Hutchinson states is on the earlier side of when a child walks.

I also learned fine motor skills such as throwing, pointing, holding, painting, and building. I was advanced in my gross and fine motor skills which contributed to my desire to play sports growing up. I was introduced and exposed to a lot of indoor and outdoor activities early on which continued to grow as I got older. When it comes to child development play is very important. If you provide stimulation and opportunities for play, a child’s motor, cognitive, language, emotional, social, and moral development is enhanced. Play helped me on a cognitive level complete Piaget’s Sensorimotor stage of intellectual development. During this stage I gained an understanding of the world through doing and learning basic shapes, textures, and object permanence. I was also read to a lot which assisted with my language development. I was an extremely talkative child and would talk to anyone that would listen, including giving strangers my number and address in the grocery store. Rosemary allowed us to make our own choices and would encourage us to try to do things on our own before providing help. This contributed to my completion of Erikson’s second stage of development, autonomy versus shame and doubt. I was proud that I could perform tasks, exercise control, and had opportunities to exercise freedom of choice. I was able to achieve a sense of independence and self-control, which was important before starting preschool.

I started preschool at the age of three at a Montessori school in Whittier. This was a private school which I attended until the sixth grade. The school was a lot smaller than public schools and because of this I felt as if it was more of a family. It was a more nurturing and individualized environment in which I knew all the office staff and teachers. I felt very comfortable at this school. I was sheltered here which I think made it hard for me to transition to a public junior high. I could concentrate on learning and did not have to worry about bullying and being made fun of. I continued to learn fine motor and language skills and was able to develop a deeper understanding of myself. I started adapting socially to playing with other children and understanding the different perspectives of other people. I developed self-confidence and a sense of purpose by learning how to plan and achieve goals while interacting with others. This is part of the third stage of Erikson’s development initiative versus guilt. At school I started a dance class. I loved this class so much that when I got a little older I started dancing at the teacher’s studio. At this time, around the age of five, I also started playing soccer. When participating in these activities I learned how to follow directions, work together as a team, problem solve, and anticipate and make decisions about what was coming next. Hutchinson states that team sports “offer the capacity for interdependence, cooperation, comprehension of division of labor, and healthy competition”. Which are all things I learned in participating in these activities. We wanted to win but the main goal was to have fun. My mom also promoted my spiritual health. Religion played a huge role in my childhood and how I was raised and grew up. I would go to church with my mother every Sunday from two years old and on. She occasionally took me when I was a baby but became more regular as I got older. I was baptized through the Catholic church and also received my first communion. I remember going to Catholic school every Saturday and participating in catechism classes. This allowed me to look more into my spiritual self. I was a part of a community and was able to learn about God and the universe. It provided me with a sense of meaning and purpose in my life. The life course perspectives model states that a life event is something that happens suddenly and can have serious and long-lasting effects. These events can be positive or negative as well as anticipated or complete surprises. The event I experienced was both negative and came by surprise.

Growing up I endured many years of sexual abuse from the ages of nine to eleven, none of which I remember. The one day that I do remember was when I was the most stressed and in crisis. This was the day he got caught. I always wondered why I was able to remember that day but nothing else growing up. It is said that people remember emotional experiences that are painful rather than ones involving actual physical pain. This event led me to interpret and perceive people as evil. I could not understand how people could do this to a child. This event was the main reason I stopped going to church and started questioning my belief in God. How could he let this happen? I spent years trying to understand the behaviors of others and regaining my spiritual self. Throughout the next few years I emotionally acted out. I would not follow rules at school and did whatever I could to try to control my environment. I told teachers that if they did not give me what I wanted that my mom would fire them because she was the office manager. I also had the principle chase me around the playground because I did not want to stop playing and come in from recess. I was put on several behavior contracts and was even suspended for slapping a girl at school. My healthy emotional development was being threatened by trauma. I had poor impulse control and had trouble identifying, expressing, and managing my feelings.

After the abuse stopped and my step-dad was caught I was taken to a therapist who said I was okay for now but would need to be brought back during my teenage years. Shortly after I graduated from sixth grade and moved to a new school for junior high. Before starting junior high, I did not have many friends. It was not until moving back in with my grandma and uncle in Hacienda Heights that I met my dear friend Tritia. Not only did she live right behind us, we also went to school together. She was someone who was smart, funny, and we had a lot in common. She was “desirable” to my family because of these reasons as well. We never got into any trouble and did typical kid stuff like going to arcades, concerts, and movies. We spent a lot of time listening to music and doing homework together. She did not mind hanging out with my family nor did I with hers. She was my one close friend growing up. At this time, I was in search for autonomy and identity. This is the time that adolescents begin to differentiate themselves from their parent or caregivers and associate more with their peers.

I was trying to find my place in the world other than always being around my family. Hanging out with her was a lot different than going to school I felt safe around her. The kids in Junior High were brutal. Starting junior high was the first time I really thought about the concept of beauty and my own physical appearance. I was about twelve and at this time learned about what the Western Culture defines as beautiful. I was made fun of a lot in school for being hairy, which I believe came genetically from my dad’s side who we think is part Middle Eastern. I had a lot of arm, leg, and eyebrow hair. This never really bothered me until the children at school formed my idea that having unnecessary hair was unattractive. This made me miserable. I started paying attention to other people in my life and really started paying attention to how they looked, including my peers. I would stare at myself in the mirror thinking about how ugly I was and what I could do to make myself beautiful. My message of beauty came from those around me especially at school. Social media was not as available as it is today, so I feel like for me I was not exposed to it as much. I also have a sweat condition that I have had my entire life. This is another way the world told me that I was gross. Growing up I wanted to go to dances, homecomings, and proms, but it was always such a chore trying to find something to wear. Dresses and heals I would sweat through, and getting my nails done was another issue in itself. I got my nails done for prom and the nail salon tried to stop helping me after an hour of doing my nails, they said it was too difficult, and they did not have strong enough fans to dry my hands. They only finished because my mom said something to them. Being beautiful should not be dictated by what other people think or believe but should come from within the person. This is especially hard to do in our society. There are so many different sources that are telling us what beauty is and if we do not meet those requirements we are ugly. This can be tied in with the third level of Bronfenbrenner’s theory is the exosystem which consists of the social institutions that affect the child indirectly. This can include the parent’s work settings and policies, extended family networks, mass media, and community resources.

In my case the mass media was the main thing that was indirectly impacting the way I looked and felt. It was teaching those around me what is considered beautiful and I was not considered it. Before starting high school my mom, sister, and I moved out of my grandma’s house and into an apartment in Fullerton. Looking back on this now I remember my therapist being spot on about the issues that I was going to have in my adolescent years. During this time is when I quickly learned what my mom considered a desirable friend to bring home. I got into a lot of trouble in high school, including using drugs and alcohol. My mom was able to see right through my friends. We dressed inappropriately, lied, and many times broke her trust. When I started dating she used to think my boyfriends were hiding things from her because they never came around or wanted to hang out with her. She was spot on about the alternative motives and to this day, that is a rule that my mom and I have with the people I date. On a developmental level, Hutchinson states that sexual abuse can have physical, cognitive, and emotional impairments. Many of mine were emotional. I experienced anxiety, depression, sleep disturbances, night terrors, self-mutilation, and substance use. Many of which developed during my early adolescent years. Much of the way I acted during these years, which I did not realize until now, can be explained with Erickson’s stages of development. Due to negative experiences that I was having at home and that I had in junior high, I did not have the chance to develop a sense of pride or accomplishment throughout my life. Instead I felt inferior and inadequate which contributed to me not gaining a sense of identity and individuality. This is Erickson’s fourth stage of development, industry versus inferiority. This led to the next stage which is identity versus role confusion. I was left not knowing who I was. I would overidentify with others which lead to me acting out and getting into trouble. I was a part of so many different groups growing up and never knew my place in the world. I would conform to what others were doing even if I did not agree with it just to fit in. This was my life up until early adulthood. I just wanted to be a part of some close relationships and feel wanted and loved.

This assignment allowed me to look deep inside myself and relate how I grew up to how I acted throughout my life. It gave me the chance to speak to my mom and really open up about the way I saw and felt about my childhood versus how she viewed my development growing up. Theories overall provide context to understanding human behavior. They are a way for us to logically make assumptions about our behavior and the behavior of our client’s. It is also a way as social workers to not only estimate what a client may do in the future but predict some of the outcomes of things that they may endure in life. Theories help us predict and explain different aspects of development in a person’s life and in doing so we are able to provide the necessary interventions that could change a client’s path if life.