Does Anxiety stem from Infancy?

[Carnation]

Just something my Therapist keeps referring to. I was ill as a young baby and spent months in Hospital. Then I was sort of abandoned growing up as my Mother had Cancer and I had to stay with neighbours a lot and didn't think I would see my Mother ever again.
My Therapist thinks that Panic and Anxiety set in at an early age which I have carried around with me.
Then other things in Life pile on until you come to a breaking point in your Life. A feeling of being deserted, alone and unloved, were all points raised on how I felt at the time.
Has anyone else had a similar situation?

[inCOGnito]

That's the thing with anxiety, it creeps up on you and you only take notice when it begins to become very uncomfortable. By that stage and for a looong time afterward you focus on the symptoms and fear themselves. They are the bad guys. But to me anxiety IS a symptom itself. Anxiety is the result of something or more likely, a multitude of things.

There may be a predisposition, like a genetic or phenotypic tendency to process more cortisol for example. But whatever genetic 'contributions' there are, there can also be diet issues, lifestyle issues, and environmental issues. Infancy and early childhood are really really important times. It's the times when we learn about life and learn how to cope with things. There are some people who think that the very act of birth is traumatic. Which in a real sense it is. You float around happy as Larry not a care in the world, then all of a sudden you get dragged into the outside world. As to whether this causes a lasting traumatic impact on the infants psychology is up to debate.

Babies and young children don't think and conceptualise as adults do, so they learn and develop using their own tools and instincts, as well as from those around them. So when traumatic things (big or small) happen a young child won't necessarily process events in the same way an adult does. So it's important how the child does that. So I have no doubt that as children we learn very effective, but ultimately disadvantageous, methods for dealing with stressful and traumatic things. A whole host of psychological constructs come in to play, repression, supression, transference, denial, avoidance, anger, etc etc. We don't consciously do this, it's much more subconscious. Take anger for example. I''m willing to bet that most anger (and especially angry people) is just a ruse to hide the hurt behind it, to hide vulnerability, and most of all to avoid feeling pain.

From the sounds of it you had plenty of reasons as a child do develop some of these psychological techniques to deal with things like abandonment, loss, and pain.

[Rennie1989]

Sounds to me that your therapist practices psychodynamic psychology. Basically, this theory suggests that our personality, defenses and mental illness (if any) is a direct result our childhood: who our role models were (usually a parent/s) and experiences. I agree with this theory, to a degree, but I think a person's life needs to be looked at more holistically. Your anxiety may have well stemmed from childhood, I believe mine was too, but it may not be the same for others.

[Tish]

Oh yes.. I think so. My childhood was so traumatic that I can't even talk about it without breaking down crying.
Good response, InCOGnito.