MY CHILD AND HIS SKIN
OUR SKIN IS THE MOST EXPOSED PART OF THE NERVOUS SYSTEM AND THE LARGEST AND MOST SENSITIVE OF ALL THE ORGANS IN THE BODY.
Through his skin, a baby learns to distinguish between tenderness and discomfort, pleasure and pain, touch and hurt. The skin functions as the boundary between our body and the world. It serves to protect and secure us, and prevent internal injuries.
To intentionally injure the skin, this protection is scared. This seems senseless. To hurt the skin goes against the primal instinct for survival, since bleeding can cause death and lead to extinction.
To protect the brain from connecting pain with pleasure, the skin needs to be protected from harmful intentions and rough handling. It is important that a baby experiences positive feeling-good emotions, through the comfort of gentle touch and the warmth and softness of cuddling which is pleasurable to the brain.
These pleasurable emotions have to be reinforced through-out the development of a child. To neglect a baby, depriving it from being picked-up, nurtured and caressed, then the skin, with its connected feelings, stays underdeveloped. From birth onwards, the mother and father are mainly the loving caregivers who foster the sensory development of their baby’s skin.
A baby, who is valued in this way, should not fall prey to the act of self-injury and hurt or damage to the skin.
Parents and caregivers are challenged by outside influences that their children get exposed to. The environment subtly presents examples of bodily self-harm and deformation of one’s own skin, where pleasure is taken in the psychological relief that such an act can cause. These examples are sometimes seen in seemingly harmless movies and television series, documentaries, cyber-clips, magazines and story-telling.
Parents and caregivers should accept the responsibility to safe-guard and shield children against detrimental role-models.
THE PERSISTANCE IN TAKING CARE OF THE SENSATIONS THAT ENTERS THE MIND THROUGH THE SKIN, WILL BE REWARDED BY HEALTHY, PSYCHOLOGICALLY MATURE CHILDREN.
Condensed by Janel van Vliet,Psychologist.
B.Com.BSK(RAU)B.A.Honn.SIELK.(RAU)M.A.SIELK.(UNISA)
Pr. 08630453 |
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