A lost childhood

The aim of the study was to describe and analyse self-biographical narratives through a retroperspective, how three exposed individuals formulated the appearance and management of trauma during their childhood. The aim was further to describe the impact the trauma had in their childhood, due to the fact that they grew up with a disabled parent. To do so I had to get information from the individuals and chose to use autobiographies as empirical material. In order to implement the study I sought answers to four questions: The first question was how adults described experienced trauma and its origin during their childhood, that their parents had caused by them, depending whether the parents having a mental or social disable? The second question was how the adults handled their experience of trauma which occurred during their childhood? The third question for the study was which consequences the trauma had on the adults as children? The last question was which different factors of protection the individuals described during their childhood and how they related to these? The study showed that risk of the individuals suffering from trauma increased the longer the individual were exposed to violence and neglect. The severity of violence and neglect contributed to the origin and duration of trauma and caused problems that persisted in the children. The results also showed that children who experienced trauma, caused by their parents, depending their parents having a mental or social disable, had multiple consequences. The parents of the children often used physical or mental abuse against the children or neglected their basic needs of food and clothes. The children showed signs of distrust of others, problems with sleeping and often felt scared and ashamed of their parent’s behaviour, when the parents were sick. Furthermore the result of the study showed that the children tried to stop the violence from their parents by all means by trying to change their own behaviour. They did so because they thought they were to blame for the violence