In infancy and early childhood, nothing is more essential to a baby than the safety of its caregiver’s warmth, touch, proximity – signals to his emotional and biological systems that he is loved. The safer a baby or small child feels, the more securely attached to the caregiver.

In these first years of life, an infant’s quest to form a love attachment with her primary caregiver, together with the brain’s amazing adaptability, interact dynamically to set enduring neural patterns in the brain that shape the child’s thinking, feeling and behavior patterns, potentially, for a lifetime.

The brain of a small child, it appears, is particularly responsive to the primary caregiver’s care in those early years.

Breaks in connection in this period of life signal danger, and when prolonged, this blocks the development of Oxytocin receptors in the brain, what grow the child’s capacity to receive and respond to love.

Produced in the hypothalamus, deep in the midbrain, Oxytocin is a naturally occurring hormone that is released into the bloodstream in contexts that produce feelings of love, kindness, care, and the like. It is this neurochemical that promotes a sense of safety and bonding, an emo-physiological response that is essential not only for love to grow, but also for the child’s normal growth and development to take place.

A child is dependent on its caregiver’s love for survival. If the parents themselves were wounded in their childhood, however, depending on the extent to which they hold onto their own childhood wounds and protective strategies, this can impair their ability to be emotionally present for the child.

Though childhood appears to be inherently wounding, nature has provided buffers, specific neural patterns that are protective in nature. This amazing safety feature, what I like to call the “inner love map,” is a pool of information that the brain accrues from childhood, which consists of beliefs, regarding how to behave to best ensure attachment needs are met for the purpose of survival. Essentially, these beliefs or “stories” allow the child’s brain to obtain quick fix releases of Oxytocin in situations that trigger a child’s “fight or flight” system.

Biologically, this has everything to do with survival, which is the primary directive of the subconscious mind, the body’s operating system.

A child comes into this world knowing its survival depends on its parents’ love. In response to emotional cues, or “signs,” that caregivers are weak or less than capable of taking care of themselves, much less the child, some children take on the role of the parent’s emotional support system. For example, it’s not unusual for a child of a parent with emotional problems or an addiction, to respond to a parent’s inability to provide consistent care by taking on the role of parent, thus acting as the parent’s primary support system, a pattern that, if uninterrupted, may endure throughout life.

It’s a matter of survival.

Here are examples of at least five subconscious fears, or “lies,” that shape the child’s behaviors to take on role as parent:

1. My parent cannot survive without me. I must protect him or her.
2. My parent cannot take care of him or herself. I must make sure they are okay.
3. My value is based on doing what makes my parent not act in ways that scare me.
4. When my parent is well and not angry, I’m safe.
5. When my parent is unhappy, my survival is on the line.

By taking on the role of parent, the child gains a way to feel valued in relation to their parent. The good feelings that the Oxytocin produces are not just nice to have sensations, they are critical for survival. (This chemical stimulation also explains why we stubbornly hold onto to these love maps as adults!)

In a sense, a child takes on the protective role of a parent because he or she is driven biologically to matter and find value in life as critical elements for its survival. The human brain has amazing abilities to get what it needs.

At subconscious levels, these love map stories give us a sense of “control” over our own survival as children. They are misleading “lies” because they are not true. While “dysfunctional” in adulthood, nevertheless, they are critical to releasing sufficient amounts of the “feel good” safety and bonding hormone to survive.

It is safe to say that, in adulthood, however, these neural patterns interfere with relationship building and intimacy. There is good news! Nature did not intend for this inner love map to be a permanent solution. Known as plasticity, your brain has a lifelong capacity to reorganize neural pathways in response to new environmental experiences and integration.

To break free of survival fears, your task now is to “see” your past, with new understanding and compassion, and replace old limiting ways of thinking, that are, essentially, the real cause of suffering in life and relationships. To the extent you learn to master your thoughts and emotions, you chart a new liberating course in your life.

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    Last reviewed: 19 Feb 2011