Affective deficiency, when we lack emotional nutrients

Affective lack generates emotional hunger and leaves a mark on our brain. The lack of a solid bond and healthy attachment leaves a permanent feeling of absence and emptiness. Furthermore, it impacts the child’s personality and outlines an almost constant fear in the adult: the fear of being emotionally failed, the anguish of being abandoned again and again.

Most of us have read and heard that the human being is, above all, a social creature. Good, From a psychological, even biological, point of view, it is necessary to go much further: people are emotions. These drives, those internal dynamics orchestrated by complex neurotransmitters, hormones and various brain structures make up who we are and what we need.

Affection, as well as Bonds based on a secure and healthy attachment imprint an almost perfect balance on our minds.. Now, any lack, any emptiness or emotional dissonance instantly awakens our instinctive alarms. That newborn knows it well who does not receive the warmth of skin that adapts to his or her own to give him security and protection. The baby who is not cared for when he cries knows it and the child who feels alone in the face of his fears knows it, whom no one welcomes, cares for or listens to.

Affective deficiency is a form of involution and generates deficits if it appears especially at an early age. In addition, This emotional void also leaves “injuries” in maturity, when we build relationships inhabited by emotional coldness, inattention or disinterest.

Anatomy of emotional lack

With the fall of communism by Nicolae Ceausescu In Romania (1989), there was the unfortunate opportunity to understand in greater depth the impact and anatomy of emotional deficiency in human beings.. What was discovered in those years was as decisive as it was shocking. The situation of those orphaned children was extremely serious. Now, what was truly dramatic was not the malnutrition or abandonment, it was above all the emotional neglect.

Harvard Medical School permanently monitored the evolution of those little ones. They wanted to know how a baby or child who had barely enjoyed contact with an adult would mature and develop. They had before them creatures who had stopped crying from a very early age because they understood that no one was going to help them. Those empty and absent looks had grown up in an emotionally sterile environment, and the subsequent consequences were going to be immense.

It could be seen that Children – who suffer from a permanent emotional deficiency throughout the first 3 years of life – suffer delays in physical growth despite receiving adequate nutrition.Brain development was slow. Something that could be seen is that neurological maturation is related to the level of affection that the child receives. Thus, factors such as genes, environment, access to a caregiver and a secure attachment bond, in addition to adequate nutrition, sensory stimulation and linguistic input are key to optimal brain development.Language disorders, elocution problems and poor vocabulary also appeared.

Likewise, it could also be seen that on average, those children did not develop skills necessary to build healthy relationships. They always showed low self-esteem, lack of confidence, emotional management problems, hyperactivity, challenging behaviors and aggression.

The research carried out showed once again the importance of attachment in the evolutionary development of children.. Having one or several reference figures capable of organizing our emotional experience, nourishing us and satisfying needs, generates a safe haven in our mind, a solid foundation on which to base our personality.

Tin men and women searching for your heart

We all remember the character of the Tin Man in the Wizard of Oz. She was looking for a heart, she was looking for that inner strength that would allow her to recover sensitivity, the opportunity to love, to be moved by things. She was looking for, perhaps, that which she had never received. She sought to connect with his emotional universe… to become human again, to put aside that tin skin that, until now, had served as a defensive barrier.

In some way, many of us also advance through our adult worlds wrapped in that tin costume trying to show a certain independence, reserve and even coldness. Because Those who suffered emotional malnutrition often tell themselves that it is better to be suspicious, that they should not get their hopes up. They devalue relationships for fear of being hurt again until little by little, they stop asking for emotional support or even offering it.

The emotional lack leaves very deep consequences. It is that emptiness that a child does not know how to name, a psychological wound that cannot be translated into words, but that remains imprinted on the conscience for life. It is also that devouring nostalgia of those who do not receive emotional reinforcement from their partner and little by little wither away. until the conclusion is reached: loneliness is often preferable to that emotional emptiness.

Let us therefore not neglect this vital nutrient. Let us think that affection is never in excess, that emotional caresses humanize us, make us grow, and strengthen us. Let us therefore be brave suppliers of this energy that grows when it is shared.

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