A person’s upbringing often acts as the very foundation for what they grow up to become. If a person is faced with hardships, in the form of their social and physical environment, they may be at risk of developing dependence to different stimuli to cope with the stressors they’ve encountered. These problems affect not just a discrete moment in the individual’s life, but rather can be applied to the entire developmental period, especially if encountered during childhood, and lead into negative effects during the latter period of their life (adulthood). These negative consequences/associations can be observed in a study by Bravemen and Gottlieb (2014), where they infer that the uniformity and reproducibility of strong associations between social (including socioeconomic) factors and a multitude of health outcomes in diverse settings and populations are well known. This is the essential take-home that Heather O’Neil portrays in her novel Lullabies for Little Criminals (2009). She allows the readers to empathize with innocent character portrayed by Baby, through demonstrating how her physical location is the causal factor associated with her harmful actions. In this essay, I analyze the effects of childhood poverty, stress, early childhood development, and the role stress and poverty have on the epigenetics of Baby’s character.
According to the Public Health Agency of Canada (2011), income and social status are the leading determinants of health in the country. In Lullabies for Little Criminals, Baby experienced the apprehensions of living in poverty with a single parent, her father Jules. Having a single parent, coupled with the fact that Baby’s father was a heroin addict made her part of the lower class of society. Demonstrating the discrimination faced by the system on individuals exposed to poverty. They were forced to move to different places frequently and struggle to get by. Because of these circumstances, Baby’s childhood consisted of a persistent poverty-stricken childhood; “Some guardian angels did a terrible job. They were given work in the poor neighborhoods where none of the others wanted to go. Every delinquent kid had one of these miserable angels who made sure that they made the worst of every situation. These angels loved when people did the wrong thing or took risks. You can’t have that many bad things happen to you without some sort of heavenly design” (O’Neil, 2009, p. 285). A study done by Kim et al. (2013) demonstrates that childhood poverty has a link to emotion dysregulation, which is further associated with negative physical and psychological health in adulthood. This can lead to the adoption of health threatening behaviors, such as drug dependency. Heroin use was chosen by Baby not because she wanted to, but because of the presence of constant worry in her life. She did not have any stability with school, friends, or even a house. Baby’s circumstances led her childhood into a flux of problems, in turn conveying her place in society and substance abuse problem.
Stress is also a key component in the social determinants of health because of its effects on an individual at the physiological level. Chronic stress, especially during childhood, can lead to prolonged biological reactions that strain the physical body. Stressful and poor living conditions can also cause continuing feelings of shame, insecurity, and worthlessness (Evans 1994), that can carry over into adulthood. In the novel, Baby encountered severely elevated stress levels early on in her development because of the actions of her father Jules. Her lower class in society also deterred her away from the norms most children her age would do, comprising her below average social gradient. Her father’s worsening drug (heroin) addiction him to become estranged from Baby’s life even when he is present. Baby moves from foster to foster home and the constant absence of a parent presence leads to a childhood of hardship and stress. His actions and her subsequent actions, lead Baby to realize what mental and physical health risks (stress, trauma, anxiety, etc.) this can lead to. Baby says that “childhood is the most valuable thing taken away from you in life, if you think about it.” (pg. 69). For instance, a study done by Shonkoff et al. (2012) suggests that many adult diseases should be viewed as developmental disorders that began early in life and that persistent health disparities associated with poverty, discrimination, or chronic stress could be reduced by the alleviation of these toxic variables during childhood. This can explain why Baby chose to use Alphonse, the pimp, as a meaningful figure in her life; “I knew that Alphonse was a pimp and sooner or later I had to turn a trick.” (pg. 215). She needed someone to simply be there for her and essentially built a dependence on him as a father figure. Heather O’Neil allows her readers to identify with baby by demonstrating how Baby’s chronic childhood stress causes her life to go in a downwards spiral. The social location of her upbringing and actions of those around her led her into an unhealthy lifestyle through the mental and physical health risks she brings onto herself.
Additionally, epigenetics can show us that individuals exposed to early childhood poverty are prone to ill-health because the stress of living under poor economic conditions impacts the body. In Lullabies for Little Criminals, Baby’s living conditions, coupled with her lack of parental guidance, lead her to a life of chronic stress and exposure to a wide set of mental health risks. Specifically, Jules drug addiction and horrible withdrawals causes him to lash out at Baby and proves the point of him being a horrible parent and role model towards his daughter. It is hypocritical for him to say things like this when he himself acts like a child. The only time Jules is honest is when he’s high. This is probably due to the drugs causing him to feel calm, collected, and stress free; “He was in the mood to talk. I could tell… When he was stoned, he was honest. But during his withdrawals… At any moment, he might burst into a rage and yell…” (pg. 18). The situations faced by Baby may suggest why she chooses to indulge in behavior that may lead her to even more disruption. Research in epigenetics indicates that alterations in an individual’s DNA may provide a causal link between social adversity and health disparity. More specifically, evidence from primate studies suggests that social status can affect the regulation of genes encoding for various types of physiological functions (i.e., cognitive functioning) (Tung et al. 2012). In Baby’s case, these early-life socioeconomic disadvantages can be associated with vulnerability to a set of adolescent and adult diseases, independent of adult socioeconomic position; these experiences may cause Baby a life filled with impaired functions.
Similarly, the cumulative effects of early life history are a significant social determinant of health. Whether its poverty, stress, or the epigenetic changes these factors cause, the cumulative effects of these biological and psychosocial experiences affect brain development. The consequences of this can be seen in Baby, as she truly had no one in her life. If Baby would have had other family to turn to when life got hard for her, she may have turned out very differently. She would have known that she is truly loved, and wouldn't have needed to make bad decisions on companionship. Baby knows that she has made some very bad decisions, but a lot of them have roots from her upbringing. Baby’s corruption experienced from early childhood causes prevents her from reaching her developmental potential. She knows that she “… had been polluted by the ridiculous dreams of junkies. I had gotten the ridiculous ego that comes with a heroin high by proxy.”(74). Overall, Heather O’Neil demonstrates there appears to be both cumulative effects of socioeconomic and related social stressors across the lifespan of Baby, that may manifest into chronic disease later in life, through the heightened effects of experiences that occurred at particularly sensitive periods in her life (i.e., childhood).
To conclude, by demonstrating how Baby’s character faced childhood poverty, stress, possible epigenetic changes, and the cumulative effects faced in early life history, Heather O’Neil