Thread by @ATMwithJacy

✨🧵THREAD ON ACES (ADVERSE CHILDHOOD EXPERIENCES)🧵✨ how trauma and your upbringing can affect literally EVERYTHING. 👇🏽👇🏽👇🏽👇🏽

Y’all still sleep? It’s NOON!

Hold on y’all I’m doing some consultations for NEW CLIENTS ✨✨✨🥰

The aces of trauma include:
Physical abuse, Sexual abuse, Emotional abuse, Physical neglect, Emotional neglect, Mental illness in the home, Divorce/Separation, Substance abuse, Domestic Violence,Having a relative who has been sent to jail or prison.

The name by default includes adverse CHILDHOOD experiences, so these things must have occurred within the ages of 0-17.

Now get this —- you can even go look this up! It’s on the CDC website because it’s an actual epidemic. ACEs contribute to so many major health issues it’s wild 🤯

A few years ago, some people did a study on how this group of events actually influenced peoples life/livelihood. This is what they found👇🏽👇🏽👇🏽👇🏽👇🏽👇🏽

The ACEs create levels of toxic stress which shape how you view yourself and how you trust yourself (e.g., safety of relationships). And they increase the risk of physical, emotional and social problems later in life.

Aces increase the odds of: alcohol and drug abuse, depression, employment difficulties, health issues such as diabetes, cancer, heart disease, and stroke, being at higher risk of contracting an STD/STI, attempting suicide.

The reason may not be because of anything you’re going through right now, but it’s about the unresolved stress, anxiety, and beliefs that you still carry from your past.

When you have unresolved trauma your nervous system operates as if you are still in danger. It doesn’t want to let it’s guard down. This is how it tries to protect you. This can continue in the background, unnoticed.

A few fast facts from the actual STUDY 👇🏽👇🏽👇🏽

Individuals who had faced 4 or more categories of ACEs were twice as likely to be diagnosed with cancer as individuals who hadn’t experienced childhood adversity.

For each ACE score a woman had, her risk of being hospitalized with an autoimmune disease rose by 20 percent.

Someone with an ACE score of 4 was 460 percent more likely to suffer from depression than someone with an ACE score of 0.

An ACE score greater than or equal to 6 shortened an individual’s lifespan by almost 20 years.

How does this affect someone’s brain? we lose the ability to respond appropriately and effectively to future stressors—10, 20, even 30 years later.

When the brain is chronically stressed, it releases a hormone that actually shrinks the size of the hippocampus, an area of our brain responsible for processing emotion and memory and managing stress.

kids who come into adolescence with a history of adversity and lack the presence of a consistent, loving adult to help them through it may become more likely to develop mood disorders or have poor executive functioning and decision-making skills.

Early trauma can make children seem “older” emotionally than their peers. It’s called “parentification”. Have you ever experienced a child that’s “wise beyond their years?”

You’re constantly in “survival mode”. You don’t know how to make sense of the world around you & your decision making skills are affected because your brain fails to recognize what’s relevant or not.

Unresolved trauma is often reason why you “numb” yourself with alcohol,drugs or other addictions. It’s why you feel as if your life is out of control. Or, that you can never seem to “get your act together.”

But keep in mind that this isn’t your fault. You are not to blame for being exposed to adverse childhood experiences. After all, you were a child. But the result is that the impact of those experiences still lingers after all of these years.

Disclaimer(s): I am a licensed professional counselor. This thread is not opinion — it’s actual facts based off of research (you can look up many articles on ACEs to prove). This does not mean you have a diagnosis! Follow me on Tik Tok & retweet this thread!

tiktok.com/@jacywiththevi…

Oh!! And share this with someone who thinks mental illness is a “mind thing” 🥰🥰🥰🥰

My personal score is a 9/10. A lot of people are asking can these statistics be changed. Just like trauma changes the brain— so does healing. You can heal and live a more stress-free life. This is why #MentalHealthAwareness is so important.

The more you know, the more you can help yourself.