Primal Wound: Latent Marks Of Childhood That Survive In The Present

The primal or primary wound is an unresolved trauma. It exemplifies and points out the violation of attachment, the breakdown of that essential bond between a child and his parents; it is the betrayal of unmet, unmet emotional needs. This pain, originating at an early age and not resolved, is something that we try to anesthetize in adulthood …, but somehow it continues to condition us.

One of the most common terms in the world of psychology and especially, from the psychoanalytic perspective, is the figure of the wound, as well as the trauma. Freud explained to us that these psychic injuries go from the outside to the inside. They occur in our closest environment, especially in our childhood. Thus, and far from dissolving over time, that original wound survives, remains latent and enters our being creating layers and more layers until it gravitates in any area of ​​our life …

If Sigmund Freud as well as his daughter Anna Freud revealed to us for the first time the importance that early experiences have in the development of our personality, in the 90s a decisive book would be published in relation to this same topic. Primal wound  or the primal wound, put on the table a reality that went much further. In this work the silent, invisible but permanent trauma experienced by adopted children was explained to us.

Nancy Verrier, author of the book, underpinned key ideas about the broken bond, the violated perinatal affection or those often unconscious wounds that human beings tend to drag in their maturity as a result of a childhood inhabited by voids.

What is the primal wound?

The human being has a need that goes beyond food. When a child comes into the world he needs first of all to feel protected, covered by affection and sustained by affection. Love places us in the world and nurtures us. Love helps us to develop, to function safely in an empathic environment, where we wake up to the world knowing that we are important to someone.

Thus, when a psychologist or therapist receives his patient, he will also try to create an environment where empathy and closeness are always evident and palpable. People need these types of nutrients, because if we do not perceive them, if we do not see or feel them, our brain reacts almost instantly. Suspicion, fear and tension appear.

This is what a child experiences when he is not securely attached. The primal wound is imprinted when the parents are not accessible emotionally, psychically and / or physically. Little by little the mind of that baby, of that child of a few years is invaded by anxiety, hunger, emotional craving, emptiness, loneliness, loss and lack of protection.

We can understand the primal wound almost as an evolutionary sacrilege. This process of “hominization” that every human being goes through, starts first of all from a solid exchange of affection and a constant closeness between mother and child. We cannot forget that a baby comes into the world with a still immature brain and that he needs that skin and that secure attachment, to continue growing and to shape an exogestation  with which to promote the continuity of his development.

If something fails in this process, if something happens in our first three years of life, an invisible and deep fracture arises, an injury that nobody sees. The same that will invalidate us (possibly) in the future in various aspects of our lives. Let’s see them below.

Effects of the primal wound

There is a very interesting book that is considered the reference manual in the study of attachment. This is the  Handbook of attachment  by psychologists Jude Cassidy and Phillip R. Shaver. In this work we are reminded that the very end of the human being is self-realization. Our purpose is to transcend, to advance in security to favor our personal and emotional growth, thus enjoying a full life with ourselves and others.

One of the most important conditions for this to happen is having had a secure, mature, close and intuitive attachment to our needs in our early years. Now if this does not happen, the primal wound arises and with it the following effects:

• Insecurity and low self-esteem.
• Impulsiveness, emotional mismanagement.

• Increased risk of suffering from various psychological disorders.
• Difficulty establishing solid emotional relationships.
• A “survival personality” develops. They try to show autonomy and security, but the emptiness survives and it is common to go through times where isolation and loneliness are needed, and moments where closeness is craved, whatever it may be, even if it is harmful or false.

How to heal our primal wound

The most appropriate in these cases is to seek professional help. In recent years, therapies such as EMDR (Desensitization and Reprocessing through Eye Movements) have become more important. It is a technique where different types of stimulation and information processing are combined so that people bring to light traumatic experiences, childhood wounds to talk about them, recognize them and manage them better.

Likewise, it is worth mentioning those basic strategies that are often used to face and heal our primal wound. They would be the following:

• Become aware of our latent emotions and give them a name.
• Call out our unmet needs (affection, support, lack of protection, empathic closeness …) We must “legitimize” those needs and not repress them.
• Reflect on the loneliness we felt in childhood. We will do it without fear, without anger and without shame. There are those who avoid thinking about the emptiness experienced in their childhood, who prefer not to look at those years of suffering because they feel pain and discomfort. We must bring to light that wounded self, that part of ourselves still full of anger because it did not experience enough affection and security.
• Understand that nothing was your responsibility. The victim is not guilty of anything.
• It allows you to release your sadness, your internal emotions. Unburden them.

• Commit yourself to change, be able to transform yourself, to take responsibility in a change towards inner well-being.

Finally, the experts in the management and coping of the primal wound and trauma, recommend us to forgive. Granting forgiveness to our parents does not relieve them of guilt, but it allows us to free ourselves from their figures. It is accepting what happened, it is assuming the reality of everything suffered but being able to offer a forgiveness that allows us to cut the bond of pain to move forward much lighter. Free of pain, rage and memories of yesterday.

Let’s think about it. The subject of the primal wound certainly arouses great interest and it is worth understanding this complex psychological reality.