*Trigger Warning*

Children are the structure of which everything that revolves around life depends upon. They are where humanity is at its most innocent and also its most susceptible. Protecting and helping the children of the future to succeed helps everyone to succeed. However, despite this, the problem of child neglect and abuse is one that is prevalent in most families. 

Mental Health has become a more well-known topic with less and less stigma as society grows. Although much of how we are mentally depends on how we are internally, situations can impact our health. Neglecting to care for and/or traumatizing a child through verbal, emotional, and physical violence is shown to have a negative impact on the mental well-being of children and the adults that grow from these experiences. 

“In this cohort study, the associations seen between childhood maltreatment and poor course of emotional disorders over the subsequent decade were largely attributable to the subjective experience of maltreatment, which was partly explained by continuity in psychopathology,” Dr. Andrea Danese and Dr. Cathy Widom published in the Academic Journal JAMA Network. 

Childhood maltreatment can create non-functioning adults in society who just continue the cycle of generational trauma. People who only knew abuse and neglect at young ages, only know that way of living. Generational trauma is a term being coined rapidly as of today, meaning the passing of negative traditions, treatments, and problems to the next generation and then the next, continuing with no stop. 

This tends to mean that parents give birth to their pain and subject their children to the same type of maltreatment they had faced as a child, or ones like it. Not only do these instances negatively affect children at the time of abuse, but it also stays with them and resonates throughout their life, impacting how they view themselves and how they interact with society and the outside world. 

A short film titled “Opal” by Jack Stauber deals with these issues within its plot. It deals with how the main character, Opal, interacts with the people within the home across from her own. Ignoring her parents’ cautions, she goes into the house interacting with a smoker old man who mistakes her for his granddaughter, Claire, a man who is surrounded by a chamber of mirrors, and a drunk woman who says she and ‘Claire’ are the same. Each interaction is more disturbing than the first until Opal reaches a room where it is then discovered that Opal is ‘Claire’ and that this group of people is her family. None of her family truly sees her, and she has used her imagination to try and imagine a life outside of her own, one that is not filled with neglect. Most of the adults do not take care of Opal, neglecting her needs, for the sake of her comforting theirs. 

This film encapsulates how child neglect impacts the young children who are stuck in these households. Highlighting how she negatively reacts when any adult chooses to interact with her, and how Opal just wants to be seen as a person, and not just an accessory for the sake of the parents. Although many people become parents for the sake of having children, there are some households that do not act this way towards their children. There are many Opals in the world who experience neglect and abuse at the hands of people who are meant to be their protectors. 

Our self-image is based upon what we see in ourselves, based on the values given to us by the world around. Being in this type of situation at such a young age, where one is most naïve to the outside world, establishes how we view ourselves as people, how useful we are to others, and how we think we should act for the sake of others. 

Though child neglect and abuse hinder the possibilities of younger people, it is possible to break the cycle. Dealing with what happened to you when you were young, and how that has made you the person you are today is one. Making an effort to acknowledge the neglect and abuse we went through helps us to adopt better skills in the outside world. 

 For more information on the impacts of child neglect, go to: 

– https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamapsychiatry/article-abstract/2806882 

-https://www.nimh.nih.gov/news/science-news/2023/mothers-difficult-childhoods-impact-their-childrens-mental-health 

– https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-1pVLJl_snc

– https://www.wakecounseling.com/therapy-blog/child-emotional-neglect 

To seek help, visit https://www.txabusehotline.org/Login/Default.aspx or call 1-800-252-5400.