Exploring childhood trauma and its effect on adulthood.

Currently, I am required to take an English 115 course where I thought I’d just be doing basic English learning things such as grammar, writing essays about whatnot, and taking a bunch of quizzes. I already assumed the negative and prepared myself for a long boring semester of English class. However, during some point in the semester, the topic turned to a book called “We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves” by Karen Joy Fowler, where the book follows the chaotic but intriguing life of UC Davis college student named Rosemary, who grew up with a chimp as a sibling, has a runaway brother that is wanted, and two semi deranged parents. To follow up with the book, my English 115 class also watched a documentary titled Project Nim, which is quite similar to the book but documents a different experience that is under the same criteria and theme. Scientists wanted to create and discover verbal communication between chimps and humans, so when Nim the chimp was just a baby, he was given to a human family to see if he can be conformed to society and communicate verbally. Overall, the experiment did not go well and caused many issues within the family and most prominently to Nim. The book and documentary opened a discussion about many issues such as trauma, memory, communication, and childhood. This part of the class became really intriguing to me, and although I had and still have a really hard time keeping up with English 115, the topics discussed are of great interest to me and I loved discussing it. I decided to narrow down my topic and do further research into childhood trauma affecting one’s adulthood, which was a recurring theme in both the book and documentary and that I actually found relevant to myself as well. I’ve come to the conclusion through my research and in-class activities that one’s childhood is a great influence in the way a person develops in present time and in their future, and if not raised correctly and/or unfortunate events have occurred in one’s life, then certain behaviors and psychological disorders are developed as a result of those events or experiences, and can negatively impact the development of the brain. For the rest of my mini-essay/blog, I want to explore the research I did and elaborate more on the documentary and book to further prove my conclusion of the impact of childhood trauma on adulthood.

Throughout the book, it is quite evident that Rosemary has many issues that stemmed from her childhood, with the chimp being the greatest factor of them all. The most saddening moment in Rosemary’s life was when her “sister” Fern, also known as the chimpanzee, randomly “disappeared” one day. It is quite obvious that being raised with a chimp is a whole different experience than being raised with a human sibling. With that being said, because Rosemary considered Fern as a sibling, she developed different perspectives, expectations, and social interactions as a result of conforming to Fern and her ways of interacting. As a result, this caused Rosemary to be an awkward child, and even an awkward adult in her social interactions. She felt as if she had no friends and had a hard time communicating with others. However, Rosemary did, in fact, make one friend. In the opening introduction of the book, Rosemary witnesses a chaotic argument between a woman and who it seemed to be her boyfriend. Out of impulse, Rosemary becomes dramatic as well and joins in. They both disrupted the peace of the environment and both got arrested. While under custody, the woman introduces herself as Harlow Fielding, who is also a UC Davis student studying drama (how ironic). Rosemary stated specifically that she was intrigued by Harlow and decided to interact with her because she exhibited the same characteristics of a chimpanzee (A.K.A Fern); being impulsive and reckless. With the information about some scenes and about the characters I have provided, it is evident that there is a deeper psychological meaning to the actions taken and the effects of certain outcomes as well, and how it plays into how someone may act or perceive the world due to the way they were raised or through past experiences.

Through my research, I found that people who have experienced childhood maltreatment or trauma may reflect those same experiences through their behavior or how they react to people and situations. It was also found that they may be drawn to people who exhibit the same characteristics as the people who they interacted with during their trauma and childhood experiences (Mulder, Tim, Kimberly C Kuiper, Claudia E Van Der Put, Geert-Jan J.M Stams, and Mark Assink, 2018). For example, as mentioned in the previous paragraph, Rosemary found herself intrigued by Harlow due to the fact that she showed many similarities to Fern, who is someone that was dear to Rosemary and was suddenly taken away from her. Although Fern may have a special place in Rosemary’s heart, it does not mean that Fern was a positive influence in Rosemary’s life. Fern was reckless, impulsive, sometimes violent, and caused problems, and because of this it became normal to Rosemary; therefore, it became a behavior that Rosemary exhibited and behavior that Rosemary was attracted to, hence the curiosity she had with Harlow. Harlow was not exactly a good influence on Rosemary and trapped Rosemary into many different issues. Wrapping and connecting all of this information up, it is evident that someone who was greatly influenced by someone in their life, positive or negative, and experienced some sort of trauma or great event in their life, will be drawn to the same negative behavior and experiences that ultimately will affect their behavior, way of life, and social interactions.

Moving on to Project Nim, I just want to say it was an extremely saddening documentary. What those people put the poor chimp through just for a psychology experiment was hard to watch, that ultimately left Nim with what it seemed like an identity crisis, trauma, violence, and non-conformed behavior that was uncontrollable, which was all due to the fact that he was given to a human family to be raised in. The first caretaker he was given to was an American family whose task was to raise Nim as a human child to conform him to society. Nim learned some English Sign Language (ESL), but he still acted like a chimp and would act out in violence where he would destroy their house or hurt the family members. This eventually became too much for the family to handle and for the next several years Nim was passed down to different caretakers because he was simply too much to handle for humans. Eventually, Nim was moved to a notorious research facility that kept chimps in small cages with other chimps. Nim had an extremely hard time socializing with other chimps as he was raised by humans and was constantly picked on by the other chimps. It was evident through Nim’s behavior and facial expressions that he was full of fear and sadness, almost as if he was in a depressive state.

'Keeping Chimpanzees In Cages Is Torture', Bob Ingersoll. 

Fortunately, Nim was moved to a ranch for abused animals where he was able to spend the last of his years in harmony and peace. The life of Nim was one that was especially important because his saddening experience as a science experiment and documentary brought awareness to the fact that one, chimps and animals are not for our amusement to use as our experiments, and two, chimps should not be confined in cages in research facilities that causes many mental issues and trauma to the chimps, who have scientifically been proven countless of times that they are just as smart and aware as humans, and their brains are no different than ours.

Going into the research I did about trauma, since the brains of chimpanzees are extremely similar to that of a human, we can draw the same conclusions to get an estimate as to how they develop certain behaviors throughout their life, and a lot of the conclusions drawn is just simple cause and effect as well. As mentioned previously, the chimp’s trauma began when they took him from his mother and in the arms of complete strangers. You may think it was extremely hard for the family to raise Nim as he’s just an animal, but imagine being disciplined for who you are and the nature of your being, which would ultimately create an identity crisis for Nim. Studies have shown that children who are in abusive households tend to exhibit the same behavior while interacting with other people and especially in schools, where reinforcement is needed by special staff and more caretaking (Shen, April Chiung-Tao, 2009). This information can be compared to Nim’s experience where he was put into a cage with other chimps of his own kind for the very first time. Because Nim was raised by a human, his behavior was more similar to the way they raised him rather than how an actual chimp would act. As a result, the other chimps would bully him and Nim became lonely, this caused him to go into a deep depressive state. Nim also had violent behaviors with most humans and would not want to interact with them at all. With research, I found that this behavior is a result of childhood betrayment that causes negative behavior towards people who have similar characteristics to the person that originally caused their trauma (Hocking, Elise C, Raluca M Simons, and Renata J Surette, 2016). With this research, it can be concluded that Nim felt betrayed by his original family and by humans in general while he was being passed down to different caretakers and put into a research facility, that caused him to be violent or negative with humans in general.

Concluding all of the research I have done, and the in-class assignments of reading the book and watching the documentary, it is quite evident that childhood trauma and certain experiences through one’s life can negatively affect the way that someone may see the world, how the world perceives them, and their overall behavior and social interactions. The book and documentary is a good way to see the trauma and its outcomes come into play, and how it affects one's life. It creates more personal experience as you can see the struggles of Rosemary and Nim and how they adapt to their later life with what they know from their experiences and how they conformed to society. The research was an add on and helped further prove and conclude my statement, creating a deeper understanding of the book and documentary, and even for one’s self. I hope that this mini-essay/blog helped you better understand yourself, a loved one, or someone you may know if they act in a particularly negative way. If you notice someone or something is off in their behavior and social interactions, remember to be the bigger person and maybe ask if they’re okay, they may be going through something. To further wrap up my text, if you may think that you are going through something similar do not hesitate to reach out for professional help, to do research, or talk to someone you can trust. Everything has a fix, it just takes time.