Sakura Haruka Could Have Been A Lot Worse: An Essay
Sakura Haruka had a rough childhood. It’s obvious to anyone that has met him before, from his quick temper to his brash attitude, he just screams "No one has ever loved me." His problem child ways were obvious, but nothing could have prepared anyone for the exact details of the devastating reality of his past.
As a preschool teacher of 7+ years I saw Sakura take on a sisyphean journey and succeed.
Through his own grit and will Sakura rolled his great boulder up and up and up the hill. When you expect the boulder to roll back down, to fall back to the dark and woeful pit it came from, Sakura digs in his heels and keeps pushing.
It's painful, it's a little wrong, but he gets there.
And just as he gets to the top, before the weight and gravity inevitably takes its toll, Furin steps in and saves Sakura from his cyclic fate.
Like Umemiya said, he's an amazing strong person.
As something that falls very neatly into my personal wheelhouse I can think of no better way to celebrate Sakura's birthday and the 5th anniversary of the manga than to tell everyone all the ways Sakura was fucked from the beginning.
it's so bad y'all
So if you want to join me, buckle up and get comfortable because I read through pages and pages of a report on the alternative care system in Japan, actual legalese, and a shit ton of studies.
tl;dr His childhood environment has put him at such a developmental disadvantage that his current emotional intelligence is nothing short of a miracle.
Also I know the newest chapter is absolutely insaneo but walk with me on this for a bit then we can go back to whatever the fuck that chapter was
Anyway let's begin *cracks knuckles*
It's important to me that this be as accessible and informed as possible, therefore all reference material must be from prominent/credible organizations or sourced information from such places. Preference is given to organizations that are dedicated to child development or welfare, but it's not a deal breaker. Materials must also be free and usable for the public.
I also only used the manga as my primary source of information on Sakura's past, but it's useful to note that all our information comes with a double filter of Sakura retelling his own past and that being translated into English. So, as serious as I may be taking this it is still a silly haha essay about a fictional character.
Moving on.
Sakura Haruka was born on April 1st of an unspecified year with his mother dying in childbirth. He is taken in by a total of five families including 3 couples (one of which appears older), and 2 families with one child. Sakura says "the only memory I’ve got of all the families I’ve been with are piercing stares that seemed to stab through me and cold homes that chilled me to the bone."
Now, brain development is fast in the first 3 years of life, a baby's brain grows 1% each day and they make over a million new neural connections per second[1]. Neural connections are what allow us to learn, so what that means is that babies take in literally everything around them before beginning to prune them later on[2].
A baby’s relationship to their caregiver is also very, very, very important to their health. It can affect behaviour in future relationships[3] as well as overall brain development, cognitive skills, and physical health[4]. In cases of neglect it has been observed that there was reduced growth in the left hemisphere of the brain (leading to an increased risk of depression), increased sensitivity in the limbic system (which controls emotional processing), and reduced growth in the hippocampus (which can lead to learning/memory impairments)[5]. And just as an adult’s mental health can affect their physical health, a baby’s mental health can cause regression in previous skills or an inability to meet developmental milestones[6].
Sakura then fast forwards to his elementary school years where he 'loses his shoes,' 'gets doused in water,' and describes everyday as "just...rough."
During this time he is also being shuffled from family to family. The only depictions we see of his experience with any family are when he is with the one that puts him in their backyard unit. There, we see that when he first moves in he is immediately sent to the unit while the family stays in the house. And although he never says it, we do see that he experiences some form of verbal/emotional abuse.
In ch 173 Kiryuu’s father begins loudly yelling at his sister for arriving home past curfew. When he says "All you do is stand there! You can’t do anything!" The panel shows a close up of Sakura’s watery eyes with a brief flash of that previous family’s father yelling at him.
Sakura does, however, say in ch 203 that he "preferred nighttime," where he could escape the coldness of everyone around him and where his "silhouette lost its shape," and "all the sadness and loneliness just melted into the darkness." At a young age we see that he separates himself from his feelings and even from his own physical person.
He removes himself from his emotions and his own body.
Later he meets his father for the first time where he is called a "murderer" with his father placing the blame of his mother’s death on Sakura. Sakura then states that "in this whole wide world there isn’t a single place where people will accept me as me." He is then dropped off at a "children’s home" and begins at a new school.
In the study "Bullying Victimization and Trauma" they quote one operational definition of bullying as "when he or she is exposed, repeatedly, and over time, to negative actions on the part of one or more other students"[7]
Eamon McCrory states in an article that verbal abuse "is generally characterized by a sustained pattern of behavior where criticism, threats or rejection of the child leads them to feel routinely belittled, blamed, threatened, frightened or ridiculed."[8]
Both experiences define that the actions need to be repeated or continual and adverse to the victim. And both experiences would produce an abnormal amount of stress in any child.
Stress on the body is fine, even good, within reason. But in Sakura's case that's not what's happening. He's on high alert constantly.
The Center on the Developing Child at Harvard says toxic stress "refers to strong, frequent, or prolonged activation of the body’s stress management system."[9] The article also introduces 2 other forms of stress (positive and tolerable stress), but all definitions operate within the context of the presence or lack of a supportive parental relationship.
Little did Nirei know to worry about Sakura’s stress levels on the first day of school, because even though Sakura's at Furin now, abused children still produce abnormal levels of cortisol even after being placed in a safe home[10]. And excessive toxic stress changes your stress management system to respond at lower thresholds, meaning it activates more frequently[11], putting Sakura in a catch-22.
And to rub more salt into the open wound that is Sakura Haruka, excess stress raises the risk to a whole army of illnesses like depression, cancer, heart disease, and alcoholism to name a few[12].
Among other illnesses the ICD-11 (International Classification of Diseases, 11th Revision) defines Depersonalization-Derealization Disorder as “persistent or recurrent experiences of depersonalization, derealization, or both.”[13]
To be diagnosed you need[14]:
Persistent experiences of depersonalization ("experiencing the self as...feeling detached from...one’s thoughts, feelings, sensations, body, or actions"), derealization ("experiencing other persons, objects, or the world as strange or unreal or feeling detached from one’s surroundings"), or both
Reality testing remains intact
Symptoms are not better explained by other mental disorders or medications
Symptoms result in significant distress or impairments in important areas of functioning
However, during times of extreme emotional duress or under stress it is still possible to experience symptoms of derealization or depersonalization, though unlike the disorder, "experiences will remit once the emotional state changes"[15].
Later, with Sakura at his new school and now living in a "children’s home," he gets into an altercation with a group of other students. In this altercation he loses it and beats them all up. Sakura says "instead of just getting back at the guys who punched me..." implying that in other cases of physical bullying he has retaliated before. He also says he experiences anger for the first time, telling us "there was just a new emotion that was born inside me."
After the fight Sakura notices that the other students kept their distance from him and we see him beginning to form his ideology from the start of the manga. He finds solace and purpose in fighting, a way for him to accept himself.
The American Psychology Association defines "negative reinforcement" as "the removal…of an aversive stimulus as a consequence of a response, which, in turn, increases the probability of that response."[16] What this means is that when Sakura fought off the people messing with him (the response) he was left alone (the removal of the aversive stimulus), which encouraged him to use fighting as a way to accept himself (increased probability of the response).
But, let’s not forget about Sakura living in a "children’s home." In ch 203 we can see half of a sign on the gate of the building he’s dropped off at. The characters we can see are 童 (child)[17], 養 (foster/nurture)[18], 護 (safeguard/protect)[19], and 園 (park/nursey/kindergarten)[20].
Certainly a "children’s home," but more specifically a Childcare Institution.
In Japan's alternative care system (foster care/adoption) they have government run "child guidance centers." They act as an aid for families and children, performing many services similar to the US's Child Protective Services[21].
When a child is deemed in need of protection they are removed from their parents and stay within the center until they are placed in a childcare institution or put in foster care[22]. However, guidance centers must get consent from the biological parents to have their child placed in either, if they do not, then the center can apply for approval from a family court (though most centers don’t as of 2014)[23].
Childcare institutions house children until they "graduate from high school, or are 15 or older and leave the education system"[24]. And Japan has a heavy reliance on using childcare institutions, resulting in a wide number of issues from overcrowding to no opportunities to develop life skills[25].
And when a child eventually leaves they receive a set sum of money and that’s it.
(A small note, since 15 is the minimum when children can leave the institutions and they get a sum of money when they do, that explains why Sakura can be on his own, his apartment looks like shit, his phone is out-of-the-box new, and possibly how he pays rent. It also lends itself to the theory that Furin is not an actual running high school, but that's neither here nor there)
Support or assistance from the institutions is limited and only lasts for a year, which is ineffective. A guarantor is needed when applying for a job or an apartment, which most children from institutions don't have.
Because of this most of the people that leave the institutions face homelessness and become reliant on social welfare. And the various costs of living and lack of well-paying employment mean even those that are able to secure employment still face homelessness and are in need of social welfare.[26]
With that, we reach the end of our timeline. But what does all this mean for Sakura?
Well, let's break it down.
From the information presented to us Sakura has had no stable or positive relationship with an adult since birth. And we learned that babies grow fast and need a positive relationship with their caregiver to develop healthy brains.
So, even though we never see any scenes of Sakura as an infant, we can reasonably believe that he was delayed as a baby.
What that means is that the milestones every infant is expected to hit by a certain age happened much later for Sakura. What this might look like is he's unresponsive to his caregivers and his environment, he doesn't calm down when he gets picked up, or he doesn't make sounds other than crying by 2 months old[27].
(If anyone wants to have a little fun and write a Sakura baby fic here's a link to all the milestones babies are expected to hit)
We then move on to his middle childhood (6yrs-12yrs) where he still has no stable or positive relationship with an adult. Though now, instead of the relationship to a caregiver being a need for brain development, it's a need to protect him from illness in the present and future.
Because he's experiencing stressors from both home and school (in the form of bullying and abuse/neglect) with no break or any person to help him, his body is taking constant strain day in and day out. The body's stress response system activating constantly to protect itself in the moment, hurts itself in the long run because it's keeping the engine running when it's not meant to do that.
When Sakura got sick after the fight with KEEL it's no surprise he did, not only was his body exhausted, but his emotional state was all over the place. This gives us a glimpse into another possible experience Sakura has had.
In ch 56 Sakura says he "always managed this kinda stuff on my own," which implies he's been sick multiple times and taken care of it himself everytime. With the colossal amount of stress his body takes it's, again, very believable to imagine he gets sick very easily because his body's immune system is constantly focused on seemingly more important threats. boys one cold away from a heart attack
We then see that Sakura shows signs of dissociation, specifically depersonalization. His body becomes undone, lost to the darkness where it can't be seen, and his emotions disappear with it. He still seems to have a sense of reality, but this is the break he doesn't get in the day.
This is the one time he's allowed to just be.
And even though there's not enough evidence to diagnose him with Depersonalization-Derealization Disorder, you don't need the disorder to experience the symptoms.
Another form of relief he eventually gets is his fighting. Once he sees that when he really fights back people leave him alone, it removes a large stressor off his system. And with that he holds tightly onto this new thing to give him purpose while putting himself into a feedback loop that's a little wrong.
If he fights the people that hurt him for being him, he stops hurting.
To stop hurting is to be alone.
To be alone is to be himself.
His dissociation was also probably the reason he felt anger for the "first time" when he snapped at the boys that messed with him. There's a possibility that he did feel anger, but it was drowned out by everything else his body was doing along with his nightly dissociation. His coping mechanism was doing it's job until it couldn't, until the anger bubbled up and over.
And though we don't see his time at the childcare institution there's a subtle implication that it wasn't great.
In ch 182 Sakura says "the place is a lot happier than I thought" about Umemiya's group home, another institution. If the place is happier than he thought it implies he had preconceived thoughts about an institution. And since he, himself, was also in one it seems his immediate thought about them doesn't lend itself to pleasant times.
And with the many, many issues with childcare institutions it's no surprise. Umemiya got lucky, Sakura got realistic.
With everything going against him Sakura turned out very okay from what we see in the beginning of the manga. He hates people that beat up the weak because they think they're strong, he defends Kotoha twice, and gives Grandpa Yama his gift he forgot on his first day in town, before he even met anyone from Furin.
At his core Sakura is kind, it's just buried under years of learned defenses.
Sakura Haruka could have been a lot worse, he should have been a lot worse. But he wasn't. He isn't.
Sakura has worked through a lot and will continue to for the rest of his life as he unlearns deeply held beliefs and his body unlearns over a decade of self protection, but I have nothing but high hopes for him. And with Furin's help his future looks bright.
Happy birthday to the miracle that is Sakura Haruka :)