Liliana began experiencing abuse as a young child and it followed her through adulthood. She explained that the abuse started while she was very young; her mother was an alcoholic and nearly beat her to death. The beatings she received from her mother became so bad that she had to go live with her grandmother. Furthermore, a family friend sexually abused Liliana as a child. As an adolescent her friends held her down while a man raped her.

She was single and lived with her daughter. She was fluent in Spanish and English. Liliana was diagnosed with degenerative bone disease at the age of 13 and had a work related injury at the age of 34. S

After an attempt to commit suicide she stated “I couldn’t keep on like that. I was killing myself, I was dying.” She found hope in her daughter and other women.

As a result of this injury, she was unable to walk for several months, and her appetite and ability to digest food changed dramatically. This made it even more difficult for her to get enough to eat. She still suffers from the effects of that injury.

While Silvia and Irene are in a very different place from Lacey, in that they are able to work and attend college, respectively, at this point in their lives, they and their children are still at risk

She attributes the violence in their relationship in part to a frustration about not being able to meet their basic needs.

Silvia can see patterns in her own parenting that mimic those of her mother, although she knows that her mother made many mistakes.

Silvia’s father went to prison when she was a baby, and served 10 years for selling drugs. Without his support, her mother struggled to provide financially for her and her brother. Her mother also suffered from a mental disorder for which she received SSI. While Silvia was growing up, the family relied on public assistance and ate mostly cheap food such as canned ravioli and Ramen noodles. Silvia remembers being hungry often and recalls that her mother often ignored Silvia and her brother.

A life course perspective takes into account the intergenerational aspects of poverty that affect child health and well being and contributes to an understanding of child food insecurity not as a static event experienced over a month or a year but rather as a series of experiences that reverberate through adulthood. With a life course perspective, childhood experiences are shown to influence and shape adult health, ability to work, and earning potential.

adversity and traumatic events that occur in childhood have a decisive impact on behaviors, choices, and social relationships that extend into adulthood. In such contexts, adults may seek out violent relationships, may constantly be in a state of heightened aggressive arousal, may withdraw and experience social isolation, or may struggle to keep boundaries associated with normal social and professional behavior related to intimacy, safety and security, and job stability.

At the time, the young children’s father had been granted full custody of the children, and Lacey was only allowed to be with them under his supervision. She had been prevented from gaining custody over these children because in 2008 she was found to be taking care of them while using drugs.

esults from the Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACE) Study have repeatedly demonstrated that, controlling for all other factors, adverse experiences such as neglect and abuse are associated with major adult diseases such as diabetes, cardiovascular disease, depression, anxiety, and early mortality.41

Wehler et al38 reported that homeless and low-income mothers who experienced sexual assault in childhood were over 4 times more likely to have household level food insecurity than women who had not been abused

Angela suffers from bouts of depression related to childhood memories of abuse.

During the visit Angela fed Paolo Spaghetti-Os and applesauce while sitting on her lap in the living room. Over the next several years, Angela missed many of Paolo’s clinic visits.

The Life Course Perspective makes sense to Jane – the idea that a combination of social, biological, psychological, behavioral, economic, and environmental risk and protective factors contribute to health across a person’s