Transcending Sexual Abuse - May 2008
"Slow, But Steady"
I'm headed out this week for the Prevent Child Abuse America annual conference in Milwaukee. It's the first time I've been to an event sponsored by an organization that didn't even exist until 1972. It has taken 36 years for the organization to grow enough so that people don't just look puzzled when it's mentioned. Over those 36 years, we have learned so many things about the effects of child abuse and about helping people to recover from it.
Most people are unaware that the very first child abuse case ever prosecuted was in 1874 in New York. It was prosecuted under the auspices of the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals. It was called the Mary Ellen case. Until the 1900s in America, children were classified, legally, with domesticated animals. It wasn't until the 1970s that abusing children was seen as harmful. That is when laws began to be passed and public awareness aroused. It has only been in the last 20 years or so that there has been any effort toward helping people recover.
I prefer to think that scientific developments are easier to deal with than social developments and this is why social change is so much slower. When you need something mechanical fixed these days one of two things happens: it's easily fixed by your efforts or a skilled repair person or you throw it out and get a new one. Clearly, this can't be done with human beings.
When I began my teaching career in the early 1960s, there was talk of a condition called "learning disability." These were the days of "patterning" children by moving their muscles for long periods of time and of believing that if a child hadn't crawled, he or she would have trouble learning to read. The idea was that the kid wouldn't move his eyes correctly for reading if he hadn't crawled.
By the mid-seventies, we were beginning to notice conditions like dyslexia. Over the 21 years I taught special needs children (1983-2004), we moved through a number of labeling systems: I started out teaching "learning disabled/behavior disordered" kids. By 2004, I was teaching "severely emotionally disturbed" children. Same kids, same behaviors. I must have been asked to teach using 25 different teaching methods and systems, one more idiotic than the next. We ended up writing individually prescribed learning systems for each child.
Don't think for a second that it wasn't incredibly complicated. Plus, everybody's rights, due process, and limitations had to be considered and addressed. We had "casts of thousands" meetings to determine exactly what aspects of addition and subtraction one 8-year-old was going to learn. Honest: "Kid" will correctly complete one-digit addition and subtraction combinations using manipulables (blocks, counters, teddy bears, etc.) to 80% accuracy as measured by standardized testing. Methods used will be direct instruction, role play, number combination cards, manipulables....This is the Reader's Digest version of one objective.
Hang in there, friends. We are slowly making it. To help speed the process, we survivors must speak out. We must be vocal about demanding research, demanding political action, demanding to have our case considered and added to the history. We must defend children. We must expose abusers. We cannot stand for further abuse, nor can we put up with those who just don't want to talk about it.
When Michael Vick promotes dog fights, we become incensed, and rightly so. We insist that he be fined, locked up, lose his job, and anything else we can think of to punish him. This is as it should be. We do not condone in any way cruelty to animals.
This is, now, an historic attitude. Are we less important and are our children less important than animals? You are just as important as your dog.
Transcending Sexual Abuse - April 2008
"The Gift of Discernment"
Survivors of sexual abuse are really never "over" it. We are warped for life, each in his or her own unique way. Of course, it can be argued that every person is warped by something, whether it is chronic illness, chaotic upbringing, wealth, poverty, an absent parent, a terrible accident. As the poet said, "the child is father to the man" (or mother to the woman). He was a romantic poet: Wordsworth, that is, not Blood, Sweat, and Tears. Whatever influences our childhood determines what challenges we face or what blessings we enjoy. For every person, this is the case. Our job as adults is to figure out what has influenced us and to choose how that is going to impact our lives.
Were you allowed to learn music as a kid? I was, and it has enriched my life beyond measure to be able to sing and play the piano, to read music, to listen to music, and to feel the rhythms of life. My children, although they like music, are mainly skilled at playing the radio or operating the CD player. They were given opportunities to explore their musical gifts, but one has a degree in fine arts and paints, another one is a teacher, the third one is in food services at the management level. Is there something wrong with that? Certainly not. While music surely influenced their growing up, as adults they have chosen a different focus. We all do that. What will my grandchildren choose? Both of them play violin in the school orchestra. They really enjoy it, but will they become musicians? It's too soon to say.
When we recognize the damage that has been done to us because of sexual abuse, we feel an amazing array of emotions: anger, guilt, shame; we feel unclean, disgusting and disgusted, fury, rage, despair, and, sometimes, hope.Before we start feeling worthwhile, contributing, hopeful on a regular basis, valuable, in control of ourselves, adult, we have to do a lot of work in recovery therapy.It is worth the tears, the raging, the sense of unfairness to arrive at full adulthood where we make conscious choices about our attitudes and behaviors.
Some people liken it to Twelve-Step programs such as AA where the first step is admitting there is a problem. Once we know what the problem is, then we can move toward solving it. Is there a one-solution-fits-all outcome? No. Don't waste time and energy following that particular dream.
We were heavily influenced by our abuse. It formed a part of our personalities. For me, it is helpful to acknowledge that, to realize that most people do not have incest in their past (yes, a lot do, but in fact two-thirds of all women have no such experience and the percentage for men is higher). I must daily, just like an alcoholic, decide that I am not going to let myself be led into the negative emotions that just naturally seem to occur when I hear about abuse; emotions that occur when I read in the paper about some character who says, "The baby wouldn't stop crying, so I shook her;" when I see yet another example of a person treated like an object.
I have to overcome my mistrust of just about everyone I meet, but I have to know who is trustworthy and who is not. It is that problem of discernment that slows most survivors down.
How do I know whom I can trust? I start slowly in new relationships. I think about them. I scrutinize the other person's behavior. I have an email "friend." I met her through another email friend. Let's call my friend "Sue." There has been no opportunity to see Sue in action, but there have been a couple of telephone calls. I sent her my book as a way for her to get acquainted with me. I met Sue because a mutual friend died. She was much closer to our friend than I was and I hoped to help her through that loss.I learned soon that Sue did not enjoy the friendship and was actually bringing me down.
You, unlike "normals," can't just be friends with everybody who comes along. You have already learned not to believe everything someone tells you. You are a skeptic and will remain a skeptic. Use that skepticism to your advantage. Find ways to interact with others that allows you to see who they really are. How do they treat others? Who else is a friend to them? What do they seem to want from you? Do you have a friend who has proved to be trustworthy to you? Ask that person's opinion. An outside, objective opinion is a good thing to have. That's how Amy Dickinson and other "advice" columnists earn a living: by being impartial observers.
I think when the Christian scripture says "Judge not lest you be judged," that sentiment needs the usual grain of salt. Jesus asks you to use your brain. You don't get to decide who gets "saved" ultimately because that is God's call, not yours. You are allowed to think and to discern, from their treatment toward you, which people are good for you and which aren't.
Still feel guilty about passing that panhandler on the street? Give $5 to the homeless shelter. Still think you should be able to salvage somebody else's life? Pray for them. Do the good things you know will help, and remember that your discernment is the critical factor. Sure, give your sister $50 to pay a bill if you can afford it and if you know that your sister is a trustworthy person who has managed her problems pretty well most of the time. If this is the seventeenth time she's gotten down on her luck and wants you to bail her out, think again. She needs more help than you can give her.
Transcending Sexual Abuse - February 2008
"Linde Grace Mounts Her Soapbox for February"
I am a little down today because our local newspaper has yet another story to follow about a terribly abused child. We have about a half dozen of these cases in some state of investigation or resolution on any given day. Today's miserable saga concerns an 11-year-old mother (this is no typo, she was actually only 10 when she gave birth) who was impregnated by her mother's 40-year-old boyfriend. DNA proved the parentage.
We survivors know that this is not as rare a situation as the general public seems to think. Folks around here are saying, "How could this happen?" just the way they, no doubt, responded to you when you told them that your parent, uncle, family friend, teacher, or whoever assaulted you. It can't be--right? Well, University Hospital has the complete records which they are sharing with the courts. DNA did its thing.
The little girl mother can see the baby who is in foster care about twice a week and the baby's grandmother can't see the baby at all and can only see her daughter under court supervision. Pretty lenient, under the circumstances, if you ask me. The father is in jail on other charges. The paper, thank God, is not running pictures of the little girl or the baby or the grandmother. I think there would be a lynch mob out here if people could locate these poor excuses for parents. I am also sure that the grandmother has a sad story of her own. I am sure the man took an opportunity to amuse himself (probably repeatedly) and never gave a thought to possible consequences.
What are we going to do about these situations that continue to arise? What are you going to do when childhood sexual abuse surfaces in your community? I wrote an editorial which was published today in the Cincinnati Enquirer in response to another child abuse case which is currently being heard in Hamilton County Court. I also fired off a letter to the editor this morning before I even got to the Opinion Page, so I am not sure the letter will be published. I hope a lot of other people wrote letters, too, because until we demand more disclosure and stop blaming victims we are going to continue to see these abuses happening. Because we have been speaking out, insisting on prosecution for offenders, and launching prevention programs, we have achieved a bit of success. People are starting to think there might be a problem.
People still don't want to talk about childhood sexual abuse. They waffle on whether water boarding is torture and deny that Americans use that particular torture. They were shocked at the pictures from Abu Ghraib, yet allow Guantanamo to function for years and years. Some people are saying the Holocaust never happened. If things don't fit neatly into our Sunday School version of reality, we tend to ignore them. It is up to us survivors of sexual abuse to yell loud and clear, "Stop!"
Do not get sidetracked by other issues. Sexual abuse is wrong wherever it occurs. It is not something the victim did. It is not anyone's right to pursue his/her own violent streak or perverted pleasure seeking at the expense of another person, regardless of that person's age. People are not objects. We must keep telling the world. We must be clear in expressing what we know. Sexual abuse must stop.
We are just beginning to make some headway, so let's rededicate ourselves to building our own lives in healthy, healing, positive ways, and to speaking out to save others. Make sure your abuser is known as an abuser. If you are somehow dependent on the abuser, start now to change that. Go to a shelter or do whatever it takes to get yourself out of the situation. Keep asking until you get help. Find mandated reporters such as teachers, physicians, and social workers and let them help you. The domestic violence national hotline number is 1-800-799-7233 or 1-800-787-3224. The national child abuse hotline is !-800-4-A-Child or 1-800-422-4453. Call your local police. Keep going until you get relief. If one person doesn't believe you, go to someone else. Don't give up!
You, your child, your neighbor--you are worth it. You do not deserve disrespect or violence. And, remember to pray for yourself and for others. We will need God' s help to stop child abuse.
Transcending Sexual Abuse - January 2008
"New Year - New Start"
This is something I received via email: “Nothing is real until you experience it; otherwise, it’s just hearsay.” Now, obviously, I don’t know who said that first or where it really came from, but I am struck by a certain amount of truth in it.
I know from being a parent that some kids have to learn everything the hard way. I have a child who was told by her father once that she had to walk into the wall about five times before she noticed the door. A lot of things (not all of them pleasant) had to be experienced by these kids before it was real. Fortunately, we didn’t experience too much tissue damage and nothing terribly serious happened, but we were lucky. As parents, we intervened only when truly catastrophic results might occur.
As a survivor of sexual abuse, you know that no loving parent intervened for you even though demonstrably catastrophic results have occurred. Sexual abuse is not hearsay for you. You know much more about it than you want to. Now that we are beginning a new year, let’s make our experience count for something positive in the world.
One thing that will help you in the new year, is to let go of your anger and forgive the person who abused you. People tell you to do that all the time, but they don’t always spell out the advantages to you in this.
First, once you let go of the anger, you have all that time and energy available to do something else that you’d rather do. I have time to write, to play with my grandchildren, to be with friends, to sort my socks, drink hot chocolate, and do a lot of other things I like to do because I am not constantly thinking about how I was done wrong. I am not plotting revenge or trying to ruin someone’s reputation because I have left that job up to my higher power.
I have a friend who, somewhat reluctantly at first, forgave her father for his abuse of her. Now she is enjoying a positive relationship with him. He has sincerely asked her forgiveness. This may not work quite as well for you as it has my friend. My dad is dead. I wouldn’t begin to say I’m sorry about that—hardly anyone was sorry at the time. But I will say that as soon as I said, “I am not going to let anything my dad did keep me from enjoying my life. Let God deal with him,” I was a happier, more productive person. I liked myself and what I was doing. Setting the record straight and dealing with eternal issues is not my job. This is not to say that you should deal with everything internally!(needs something)
A second benefit of living in an attitude of forgiveness is that you can do good in the world with your life experience. You can speak up in defense of children, lobby your representatives from your hometown on up to Washington, D.C. to seek out and treat offenders, to educate and prevent abuse in your own family and neighborhood, and to make your voice heard.
Average people are beginning to faintly grasp the problem of sexual abuse. They need us to keep the issues before them. They don’t understand that sexual abuse is so widespread or that it is so destructive, but it’s starting to dawn on them. In today’s paper, there is a story about a sex offender who was sentenced for his behavior. The parents of the two victims made victim impact statements that were powerful. They influenced the sentence that the judge pronounced.
We need to be there for the candlelight vigils, the pinwheel display of Prevent Child Abuse America in April, and in court as supportive observers. We need to use our experience to write letters to the editor to make people aware of what is happening. Sexual abuse happened to you, but you can use it to make your life and the lives of others meaningful. Whatever your sphere of influence, be it a classroom, an office, the pulpit, or just the coffee shop, utilize every opportunity to tell others that child and sexual abuse are not inevitable. It can be stopped.
This is an election year. The third way to utilize your experience for good is to examine the issues and carefully study the candidates. Ask them what they are going to do to end sexual abuse. Get their opinions on the problems facing us as survivors. Vote accordingly. Get on the band wagon to engineer reforms at all levels of government. We are a special interest group, too.
Transcending Sexual Abuse - December 2007
" 'Tis the Season to Hope"
Have you managed, so far, to keep your focus on the important things this season? I am constantly barraged with emails and other notices that I should buy some more stuff or be very careful (or very enraged, depending on the source) that Christ either stays in or stays out of Christmas, that the economy is depressed ( so am I, but so what?), that no good is going to come out of any kind of politics or government (we knew that), but HOPE springs eternal in my heart. I HOPE that the new year brings people of faith to a place in which they are more comfortable with diversity; that we all do better financially and health-wise; and that Peace on Earth, goodwill to all isn’t just a pretty little song.
No matter what kind of suffering we have had to deal with in our lives, now or past, we can have HOPE. Hope is free, nor does hope harm the environment. It may or may not change anybody’s mind or behavior (other than our own), but it WILL change us. Hope will make us work harder to achieve positive goals.
Hope is helping my friend who is in prison for murdering her abuser. She can be freed under the battered women laws in her state. After nearly 17 years of hope, she has found a lawyer who will go to bat for her.
Hope enables me to keep writing and keep working to change minds and hearts so that people will recognize the peril that continuing to treat others as objects puts all of us in.
It is easy to despair, to believe that nothing will change, to give up—but we can’t stop now! Maybe this is the year you make other plans rather than to join drunken, abusive people simply because they are related to you. I can tell you I’d rather eat a frozen dinner in front of my TV than sit for hours with people I don’t even like!
Volunteer at a homeless shelter or other charity that is serving a Christmas dinner for the poor. Spend your money on Toys for Tots. Let the little child in you delight in the lights and excitement of the season. Don’t do anything you don’t want to do. Practice, if you have to, saying, “No, thank you,” “I already have plans for that time,” “I will come to see you for a while on......” Do the holidays on your terms. Others have decided for you too much already. Nobody who really loves you will object to you looking out for your own emotional (and possibly) physical health. Spend your time with healthy people who like you simply for yourself—and those people are out there. Find them!
Give HOPE! Say the encouraging word. Say “Thank you.” Listen to the bells. Think about the contents of your heart, not your pocketbook. Do the kind thing. Don’t sell yourself short—you have much to offer. Follow your heart.
I would like to share with you one of my favorite poems by a famous poet. This is Emily Dickinson’s poem XXXII:
Hope is the thing with feathers
That perches in the soul,
And sings the tune without the words,
And never stops at all,
And sweetest in the gale is heard;
And sore must be the storm
That could abash the little bird
That kept so many warm.
I’ve heard it in the chillest land,
And on the strangest sea,
Yet, never, in extremity,
It asked a crumb of me.
May this holiday season mark a rebirth of your self and engender great HOPE in your life.
Transcending Sexual Abuse - November 2007
"Giving our Gifts"
What are you thankful for? Can you imagine being thankful for the sexual abuse you have survived? Well, maybe thankful doesn't express the feeling you may have, but without the various trials and tribulations we endure through life, we do not become our authentic selves. It usually takes a long time to realize that our growth through the difficult situations we experience eventually leads to a kind of fruition, where we stand as examples to others of the resiliency and strength of the human spirit. Difficulties have brought about every great invention, every ethical value, and every humane act that have ever benefited our world.
Why did the Pilgrims come to the US? They had unbearable difficulty in their home country. How did Edison become the amazing inventor? He had so many difficulties at school that he was sent home as a small child. How did child abuse laws of any type come into being? In 1884, the first case of child abuse was tried on the basis of cruelty to animals laws. This happened in New York.
Perhaps you've heard the saying, "When life gives you lemons, make lemonade." That is what I believe I am doing with my life, now, and you can do it, too. If you have experienced trouble, you need to show how you've overcome it, and you need to do everything in your power to stop this trouble from happening to others, especially those close to you.
Will you allow anyone to abuse your child? Will you allow predators to go unstopped? Will you keep quiet when you know about abuse? Will you speak up in defense of victims? Or will you be satisfied that your problem is solved?
I think that we experience problems and difficulties so that we can learn to stop them, so that every individual makes a difference. You are important. The world would be a very different place without you. No matter what you have experienced, you have a gift to give the world. You can enlighten; you can prevent; you can speak out; you can write that letter to the editor; you can make sure your child gets help if he or she needs it; you can say no. You can live your life as the gift it is.
If you haven't been making the most of your experience, this could be the time that you think about how to use it. Take this holiday time to think about how you can gift the world with your influence. Maybe you will volunteer someplace where you can mentor other survivors, maybe you will speak or write, maybe you will become a foster parent, or a volunteer in schools. You will come up with the right fit for you as you ponder the meaning of your experience.
When January 1st comes and someone asks, "What's your New Year's Resolution?", you will give an answer that means something, an answer that will make a difference.
Transcending Sexual Abuse - October 2007
"When Everything Goes Wrong"
My family has fallen on one of those periods when just about everything goes wrong. First, my brother died. No sooner had we begun to recover from that, but my daughter's family of in-laws had two tragedies in a row.
She now required attention from me. Then, a series of problems and miseries occurred with several of my friends, culminating in the suicide of a long-time friend's son. Sometimes there does not seem to be a break in the clouds anywhere.
This series of events has caused me to draw deeply from both the strength I gained in therapy and from trying to live according to Christian principles. I have realized that I really know how to deal with trouble--not that I wanted to know. I've had much more practice than I want to have.
What coping devices do you use? Here are some things that have been helpful to me:
1. Prayer--for myself and others plus enlisting others to help me pray. This is a major step for survivors. We tend to think we aren't worth anybody's effort, so we tend not to ask for help when we need it. Ask. You deserve it.
2. Listening to people you trust tell you they love you. You may or may not need somebody to bring in food, but you do need to listen to those words of love and caring that pour in when you have trouble. Cultivate friends like this by being a friend like this yourself.
3. Clear thinking -- don't get involved in drugs or alcohol to excess. I have consulted my physician for help with the choices I need to make.
4. Using knowledge acquired in recovery. I analyzed what absolutely needed my attention and what could be let go; remembering that as bad as it was/is, it could be better (or worse): it was going to change; I am an adult and I have control over my attitudes and the way I see my choices. I also used techniques I learned in therapy such as journaling, making lists, listing pros and cons of a way to handle a situation, etc.
5. Shared feelings with close friends. I tried not to stress out friends by calling in the middle of the night or demanding a lot of time devoted to me, but I asked for time as I needed it. I wrote love letters to my grandsons: golden strokes for their bad days that they can always keep. Tell the people who matter that they do matter to you. You'll never have a better opportunity.
You may have a different list. You may have clothes or a teddy bear that comfort you--that is fine. The thing you cannot do is expect someone else to make it all better for you. A significant difference between survivors and the rest of the world is that we learned that people who are supposed to love you are not likely to do anything positive for you, so you look elsewhere. That means we have to be especially careful about our choices of friends and develop ways of consoling ourselves. We are at a distinct advantage: we know who is responsible for our well-being--it is we ourselves.
I have found that having been responsible all my life for the way I respond to trouble, I'm the winner when bad things happen. My life may change. I have to adapt to the changes, but I get to choose the way I adapt.
Transcending Sexual Abuse - September 2007
"How Does it Affect You?"
I had a conversation with a friend who is also a survivor today. She was critiquing some writing I am doing for an anthology and we discovered two different ways in which we relate to people who remind us of our abusers. In both of our cases, the abuser was our father. If your abuser was the same gender as you, you may have some other response that we didn't think of. If so, let me know how it's different for you.
Here's what we noticed: I was very young when the abuse started (about 2 years old). What I learned, among other things, that persists to this day, is that men are not to be trusted in any way. I do not want men to touch me at all and, after many years of work, I have learned to trust a select few men, to allow myself to hug and be hugged by these few men, and to keep myself from becoming in any way sexually involved with men. This relates directly to the fear I felt as a child, to the physical revulsion I experienced, and to the feeling of loss of control of myself. I keep a tight grip on myself when men are around.
Because my mother did not do anything to prevent my abuse or protect me in any way, I learned that women are not much use. You are on your own out there in the big world. If a woman wants to get close to me, she will have to demonstrate clearly that she is on my side and be completely trustworthy. After many years of therapy and work, I have learned to care for and love a number of women whom I consider dear friends.
Today, my friend explained her different experience. Because of the incest in her background, she learned that she must do whatever is required to please a man. She must be compliant, uncomplaining, and attractive. She learned, therefore, to flirt and to be tempted by any man who showed her any attention.
Unlike my mother, her mother did everything she could to protect and support the daughter. The mother was unable to leave the situation, but she made a huge effort to mitigate the circumstances.
Now, my friend is tempted, at times, to cheat on her husband whom she dearly loves. Fortunately, he understands her problem and is able to encourage and support her as she struggles to remain faithful to him. She has been successful up to now. When she finds herself in a dangerous situation, she is able to call her husband who then "talks her down." This is a pretty heavy burden for the husband, but she works hard to keep this quirk of hers a non-problem.
Linde's other columns:
2007 - Summer through September
2007 - April through June
2007 - January through March
2006
Linde Grace White, author of Dollbaby: Triumph Over Childhood Sexual Abuse, Cedar House, 2005
To learn more about Linde, click here.
~ DewSpirit Publishing ~ PO Box 1208 ~ Dickinson, ND 58601 ~ 701.260.3614 ~
Copyright © 2006 - 2008 DewSpirit Publishing. Website design by Hurtdidit, LLC..
