Adrenal Burnout
Another casualty of this runaway stress response, is the over production of adrenaline, the stress hormone produced by the adrenals. We find in our research that young children, under the age of ten, who have been harmed or neglected have excessive production of adrenaline. In addition, we have found that as these children from hard place become about ten or eleven years of age the adrenals “burn out” because they have pumped so hard, for so long. We’ve seen children four years old who have the adrenal depletion typically only seen in very, elderly individuals. Sadly, the overproduction of adrenaline, for example, is associated with withdrawn behaviors, depressed behaviors, and anxious/afraid behaviors (“acting-in behaviors”). And those same children, by the age of nine or ten, are vulnerable for adrenal depletion that is associated with aggression, delinquency and other externalizing behaviors (“acting-out behaviors”).Clearly, these changes in brain development are important mechanisms that drive the appearance of mental illness. Unfortunately, these changes are reinforced by the child’s experience with early caregivers. Inability to trust, lack of attachment to a safe caregiver, over production of excitatory brain chemicals, and underproduction of serotonin and other calming brain chemicals – these are the mechanisms that actually drive mental illness in many children.
