There’s a hidden ‘desert’ in the field of mental health which offers little support for life or growth. So few people have chosen to venture into this field, that a lack of information has resulted in inadequate maps which could end the isolation of those still in the desert, or provide help for those who seek to get them out. As a result, an adult raised in this desert (called child neglect), is left alone to suffer from their life taboo: ‘the lack of parenting then, absolutely doesn’t matter now’. 

When ‘maladaptive behavior’ isn’t maladaptive:
For some at an early age, ‘doing without’ undermined everyday life, and in part caused ‘confidence’ (a fruit of growing up), to become replaced by ‘concealment’. Such replacement behaviors are labeled ‘mal-adaptive’ by those ignorant of what a child was originally adapting to. Criticizing our adapting (adaptations to neglect, cannot also be mal-adaptations to neglect) encourages blame instead of seeing behaviors as a predictable effect of loss and grief. In the extreme, blame can add a critical factor when it shows up unannounced during major turning points in life.

Confronting the desert is like insurance against future losses:
Understanding a desert of hopelessness, can help anticipate the tendency for current losses, to automatically trigger past beliefs created during a childhood where ‘nothing happened’. Once we see that being raised in a desert of ‘doing without’ exposes us to later harm, then, like seeking insurance, we can develop a plan to minimize future losses in advance of triggering stressors.

The “Doing Without” book series of lessons:
The DW book series is to help those interested in rebuilding their life. It is also to help those in support roles as: counselors, pastors, and leaders in transitional or inpatient housing facilities or study groups. The guided discovery lessons allow us to see how a child without guidance, attempted to respond in a creative way to the complicated, confusing world of ‘things that didn't happen’. Those who have already tried everything else, or those who are inclined to see the lack of parental engagement as a widening source of child trauma, may both come to agree that addressing this last taboo in mental health can change lives.