this patience-stretching process, I was still holding my breath, figuratively and often literally. Nothing could now overcome my determination to hold my daughter, Lily, and welcome her into our family. When that moment finally came, however, I was nonetheless unprepared for the overwhelming power of our connection.
One of our adoption counselors had emphasized the vital importance of not only holding my daughter closely and carefully but allowing her to experience skin-on-skin contact, to hear my heart beating just as she had heard her mother’ s in utero. So I wanted to begin my role as a father to Lily with extra intentional care. To let go of all the challenges of the process and to embrace my baby daughter.
She looked so innocent, so beautifully dependent on me and her new mom. Cradling her in my arms, gently swaying to rock her to sleep, I sensed a visceral power rising within me, a primal urge to protect her, nurture her, and defend her with my life if needed. Seeing how helpless she was, surely this was what any parent would feel.
Shortly after her arrival, however, I began to experience something completely unexpected at the opposite end of the emotional spectrum. Previously buried memories of my childhood sexual abuse surfaced and caused panic attacks as a result of posttraumatic stress disorder( PTSD). While I had already remembered more than enough of the unbearable incidents of abuse I suffered, these new memories felt exponentially worse. Memories of my uncle taking me to a smokefilled, seedy hotel room in the city where we lived and allowing other men to use me in exchange for cash.
While the two concurrent emotional experiences— welcoming and holding our daughter as well as remembering and reacting to new horrific memories of my childhood— seemed coincidental, I eventually realized what they had in common. They both revolved around attachment.
While I was aware of being abused by my uncle, I had never consciously remembered being trafficked in a rundown hotel room. Yet my body remembered even before my mind could catch up. Then as I remembered and began processing the specifics of suppressed trauma, I felt intensely vulnerable, childlike, fearful, anxious, and needy.
And what I longed for and needed as I absorbed the impact of such horrendous memories were the same four things my new baby daughter needed— to be seen, soothed, safe, and secure.
These four S-words summarize the fundamental human needs each of us experiences as newborns, as children, as adolescents, and as adults.
These needs are wired into our DNA to ensure our survival and ability to thrive in the world. We must rely on relationships with others around us in order for these needs to be
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