Cornell psychologist Cindy Hazan and her colleagues have gone so far as to chart the direct parallels between the many stages of childhood attachment and adult romantic love. What they found is that childhood experiences do trigger, and sometimes garble or distort, the love relationships made later. But nothing is cast in stone. As the child grows, it forges new attachments and some of these may dilute bad childhood experiences. As anyone who has received or dispensed psychotherapy knows, it's a profession whose mainspring is love.
People appear with frayed seams and spilling pockets.
Some appear pathologically disheartened by a childhood filled with hazard, molestation, and reproach. All rights reserved.