Parent Brain
Do you know about the ways your brain changes throughout life and how this might affect your sense of who you are?
The brain is constantly changing – and there are particularly intense bouts. Important stages in brain development that I know of are: early childhood, adolescence / puberty, middle-age / menopause and matrescence / patrescence. All ordinary. All turbulent for the incredible and bewildering human brain.
Matrescence describes the phase when a female becomes pregnant, gives birth, breastfeeds and spends time bonding with a child. Profound physiological changes are taking place - she and baby are vulnerable and choc-full of potential. Patrescence is the equivalent stage for men – and it seems it is not simply about social identity but is also a physical and hormonal transition. (I’ll come back to these.)
I shared a link to a positive and easy-to-digest video about brain changes during adolescence in my first post. I like it because it challenges prevalent negative discourses about the teen years that come up over and over again in an adult-centred world.
Many people are now aware of the importance of the first two years of life, when the brain is busy with incredible, rapid growth. Every second of experience is making an impact and it really matters, how people are treated in these years.
Counselling is often entered in middle age. People might have time and resource – and they might have ‘crises’! Hormonal, physical and social changes are taking place, which can be challenging.
Back to becoming a parent, then. Reading this article by Lucy Jones about her book Matrescence, I was struck by the statement: “becoming a mother is more of a big deal than western society allows”. I want to make space for people to process experiences, particularly when dominant narratives of the world we live in deny us that space. Parents are told by society that they can, and so often expect themselves to, provide some intense but short-term physical availability, jiggle around the schedules and finances, then steadily return to pre-parenthood levels of ‘productivity’ and minimal neediness. But it is not that easy.
I often yell at the telly when shows depict families with school-age (or younger) children who come down for tea then silently return to – where? their bedrooms? - making way for an interesting bit of screen dialogue from mum, dad and their intellectually-stimulating, wine-quaffing friends. “In what world does this happen?!” I protest.
When we’re told implicitly or indirectly that we ‘should’ be something, and the reality doesn’t match up, we can feel confused and ashamed, rather than noticing and questioning the ‘should’ we received. This happens to many parents, adding to the inevitable challenge of this stage of life - when the brain is going through major development and change.
