Case: Nora resides with her parents in southern Florida. Recently her area was hit by a hurricane significantly damaging her home. Nora, her parents, and her infant brother are now residing with the family in a three-bedroom home. Nora’s parents were facing some financial difficulties recently and did not have hurricane insurance on their home. It is unclear when they will be able to move back into their home. Nora is now outside of her school district and will have to re-enroll if she doesn’t move back in the next two weeks

Middle Childhood Profile-Nora

Definition of Trauma

The American Psychological Association (2021) describes trauma as the emotional reaction to a devastating event such as an accident, sexual assault, or disaster. Immediately following the occurrence, shock and denial are typical reactions. Later in time, reactions might include strained relationships, unforeseeable emotions, flashbacks, and physical symptoms like nausea and headaches. Even though it’s normal to have these feelings, some individuals struggle to move on with their normal lives. Some of the major events that might cause trauma include: witnessing death, terrorism, natural disasters, serious illness, war, domestic abuse, rape, and physical injury, such as one caused by a severe car accident. Middle childhood is a highly sensitive period, and trauma experienced during this time could have a damaging and long-lasting impact socially, physically, and on a child’s emotional growth. Hence, constant family support is needed to help the child through such negative experiences.

Physical Milestones in Middle Childhood and Trauma Effects

The middle childhood stage comprises children in the age bracket of 6 to 12 years. These older children grow both cognitively and physically just like infants, preschoolers, and toddlers, although at a slower rate. Physical development during middle childhood is characterized by major variations in growth patterns due to genetics, environment, nutrition, hormones, ethnic origin, and gender, among others. Most boys who experience preadolescent growth spurt growth at 11 or 12 years, whereas girls experience similar growth at 9 or 10. Children who are subject to inadequate medical attention or nutrition face the risk of impeded or stunted growth. At the onset of the middle childhood stage, children usually have acquired a leaner and more athletic appearance. Before the onset of puberty, boys and girls still have matching body proportions and shapes. They grow about 3 inches and gain roughly 7 pounds every year. At the onset of puberty, they mature sexually into adults and teenagers. Girls are generally smaller and have less muscle mass but might become larger than boys later in puberty. Once boys begin sexually maturing, they eventually surpass girls’ agemates in terms of weight and height development. It is during this period that issues of obesity are common.

According to Ding et al (2017), children who are exposed to trauma tend to develop depression. Poor eating habits that result in obesity, bulimia, or anorexia might be coping tactics for depression (Jordan, 2020). In fact, research shows that childhood trauma is a major predictor of obesity in the middle childhood stage (McKelvey, Saccente & Swindle, 2019). Youth who have previously experienced trauma are also disposed to suffer from body dysregulation, which causes them to either over-respond or under-respond to sensory stimuli. In some cases, they might manifest hypersensitivity to light, touch, smells, or sounds or might manifest analgesic conditions, where they are unaware of internal sensations, touch, or pain (The National Child Traumatic Stress Network, 2021). Consequently, they may injure themselves without feeling pain, be unaware of the physical problems they suffer from, or complain of chronic pain in body parts with no underlying physical causes.

Cognitive Milestones in Middle Childhood and Trauma Effects

During middle childhood, growth in the frontal lobes occurs, helping them in planning, ethical decision-making, social judgment, and reasoning. Damage to the frontal lobes part of the brain might result in poor judgement making, unwarranted emotional outbursts, and poor planning ability. Middle childhood is the time for a concrete operational stage where children make use of logical operations and thoughts. In addition, they have well-formed short- and long-term memories and aspects such as working memory capacity, usage of other memory strategies, and increased ability to pay attention.

Children who have undergone complex trauma histories might experience challenges in thinking clearly, problem-solving, or reasoning. Such children might have trouble planning ahead and acting appropriately for the future. When faced with constant threats, children aim all their internal resources towards survival. If their bodies adapt to constant stress response situations, they might have difficulty calmly thinking through a problem and consider other alternatives (The National Child Traumatic Stress Network, 2021). They may find difficulty in acquiring new skills or acquiring new information. In addition, they may have trouble sustaining curiosity or attention or experience distractions from trauma reminder responses. Similarly, they may manifest deficits in abstract reasoning skills and difficulty learning. Hask