Parents Whose children have been sexually abused Community Group
This group is for parents whose children have been sexually abused. We welcome both Mothers and Fathers. Here, we can offer support to one another. We can vent, cry and lift each other up. No condemning or criticizing allowed. We are here for support. We LOVE (((HUGS))) !
Hi All,
This is my first time here. I arrived to your site through the link provided at MOSAC.net (another super helpful site for mothers of sexually abused children).
I confess that am kind of scared to write here, since I now mistrust everything, everyone, and I wonder who maybe reading my post now... sorry for that...
At the same time, I need your advice so much... My husband and I are doing therapy altogether with our abused children, but although the kids seem to be improving, our marriage is getting worse than it was before the disclosure by one of my kinds.
I have three boys, aged 4, 2 and 0. Numbers 1 and 2 where abused by my husband's father, their grandfather, whom they (and we) adored. He is 68. He raped them violently (especially number 1) and tried to pervert their little minds in ways hard to imagine. My babies. We went to the police and an investigation is taking place, but where I leave there are usually low expectations for justice on Earth. We will have to wait for God's justice.
We trusted my father-in-law so much, he and his wife live in our same building and he took our children to kindergarten along with me and our husband, had breakfast with us at home, was always available if I needed anything (I work part-time and had 3 boys in 3 years)... he always told us that grandma was inviting them for tea time, and the big mystery to me and my husband is: where was she when grandpa was abusing our angels?
Only the baby was spared... thanks to the courage of my eldest who has just turned four years old and decided to speak out (around 5 months ago) in spite of the bribes and threats of the molester. My eldest told us (my husband and I) that grandpa had told him of his plans of raping his baby brother within some months as well, and he decided it was time to protect his siblings. My eldest revives the abuses day and night, through nightmares, crying, fighting, saying how much it hurts and asking for her mammy... myself, who could not protect him. I am such an idiot, trusting my in-laws...
I am a walking dead. We love our children so much, as you do. We do our best for them... they were so wanted, I had them when I was over 36... I always felt blessed to have them. I have not shared this with anyone with the exception of my parents and the Police and Doctor/ Therapist. But therapy is not working for us (it does for our kids, as I said). My husband just lost his job. We have only 5 months of savings left. In the meantime, the wife of the abuser, my mother-in-law, hired to most expensive lawyer in town for the abuser, and decided to fight "HER" sorrow, as she told my husband, by renovating her kitchen...
I cannot breath. I think of committing suicide - but who, then, would take care of my babies? Thank you for any advice.
Hugs
This is my first time here. I arrived to your site through the link provided at MOSAC.net (another super helpful site for mothers of sexually abused children).
I confess that am kind of scared to write here, since I now mistrust everything, everyone, and I wonder who maybe reading my post now... sorry for that...
At the same time, I need your advice so much... My husband and I are doing therapy altogether with our abused children, but although the kids seem to be improving, our marriage is getting worse than it was before the disclosure by one of my kinds.
I have three boys, aged 4, 2 and 0. Numbers 1 and 2 where abused by my husband's father, their grandfather, whom they (and we) adored. He is 68. He raped them violently (especially number 1) and tried to pervert their little minds in ways hard to imagine. My babies. We went to the police and an investigation is taking place, but where I leave there are usually low expectations for justice on Earth. We will have to wait for God's justice.
We trusted my father-in-law so much, he and his wife live in our same building and he took our children to kindergarten along with me and our husband, had breakfast with us at home, was always available if I needed anything (I work part-time and had 3 boys in 3 years)... he always told us that grandma was inviting them for tea time, and the big mystery to me and my husband is: where was she when grandpa was abusing our angels?
Only the baby was spared... thanks to the courage of my eldest who has just turned four years old and decided to speak out (around 5 months ago) in spite of the bribes and threats of the molester. My eldest told us (my husband and I) that grandpa had told him of his plans of raping his baby brother within some months as well, and he decided it was time to protect his siblings. My eldest revives the abuses day and night, through nightmares, crying, fighting, saying how much it hurts and asking for her mammy... myself, who could not protect him. I am such an idiot, trusting my in-laws...
I am a walking dead. We love our children so much, as you do. We do our best for them... they were so wanted, I had them when I was over 36... I always felt blessed to have them. I have not shared this with anyone with the exception of my parents and the Police and Doctor/ Therapist. But therapy is not working for us (it does for our kids, as I said). My husband just lost his job. We have only 5 months of savings left. In the meantime, the wife of the abuser, my mother-in-law, hired to most expensive lawyer in town for the abuser, and decided to fight "HER" sorrow, as she told my husband, by renovating her kitchen...
I cannot breath. I think of committing suicide - but who, then, would take care of my babies? Thank you for any advice.
Hugs
1.) Your son disclosed (and saved his little brother) while he is young, and you can make sure your children get every intervention they need just as soon as possible.
2.) They are responding well to therapy; this won't eradicate the nightmares, yet, but nightmares aren't the only place your son gets to examine his reality. For too many who don't disclose until they are older, nightmares and behavioral issues are their only outlet.
3.) You are still married -- no permanent harm has come to your marriage.
4.) You've already found www.mosac.net, so you're well aware that what you're seeing in your sons is normal in survivors, and so your your own emotions as a mom.
I am a huge fan of www.mosac.net, but it has little to say about one's marriage, post-disclosure, to a non-offending adult. Almost every parent who has come to this page has experienced major marital stress as a result of this crime. If the non-offending spouse (NOS) is a blood relative of the abuser, it seems to be even more distressing; the NOS has to go through all the same emotions, but may feel extra guilt or blame for not protecting the child/children. Your husband is going through three losses at once -- his children's lost innocence, a "divorce" from his own parents, AND he has lost his job which, so he probably feels pretty powerless. Powerlessness is not a great platform on which to move forward. Another aspect is a challenge to our own sexuality -- some of us have experienced the loss of any sex drive because the thought of sex has been thoroughly corrupted by the trauma our families have experienced; a sex drive seems to return as we see our own children's lives becoming less about trauma -- and in general, the more we see our children healing, the more we can heal ourselves, so this is yet another blessing you can count.
So what can you do about this at the moment? Take it easy on your husband, and, especially, take care of yourself. This was NOT your fault -- working part-time is not a sin, and most people would be thrilled to have (in effect) live-in child care, and would have taken up the same offers of help!!! To that point, I can't imagine how difficult it must be to live in the same building as the abuser!! How likely is that going to change? I'm sure it's tough to impossible to pass credit checks for a move without a source of income, but as soon as the job situation changes, if it were up to me, you guys would be out of there in a heartbeat.
More in a moment.....
I could say more, but I will let others have the floor. I am thinking of you!!
I am just wordless. I cannot thank you enough for your timely words and insight. If pain deliver sweet fruits, I can guarantee that your sorrow has become honey for me in this horrible moments we are going through. Immediately after I sent the post, I somehow got the strength to make a tea for my husband, who was sick in bed, and gave him some comfort. He was up within a minute, weak as he was, to thank me and to tell me: "I love you, you are the only person in the world that I love and that is left". That gave me, in turn, some strength to hug him back, and we cried together. Once again. My kids came around that very second, and he and myself got some strength to smile at them, to put our grief back and to focus on them, as always. They are the primary victims, including the non-abused baby, who was 4 months-old when the eldest disclosed his torments... I breastfed him while I was crying so many times, I have been so absent while he smiled so often, and I am sure he is feeling all the suffering around our home, especially because my eldest spent four months (post disclosure) with a very aggressive and sexualized behavior... The second one stopped talking, regressed in so many ways... It is as if a bomb had fallen in the middle of our apartment. I feel as if a murdered had entered our home and killed us, so unexpected, so violent, so terrible the consequences have been, and will be for all of us. Naive1, what you said about my husband is so true, he loved his parents (even if his father was always hyper critical of him, arrogant, and selfish with his wife and sons... not to his grandsons ---- well ---- now we know why...). My husband is so lonely, he feels so guilty, but sometimes he is abusive as well, shouting at the kids, shouting at me or giving me the "silence treatment" (he has traits of passive-aggressivty, and the therapists and I suspect he has been abused as a child as well, though my husband claims not to remember anything... very timely for his father!) About moving, you are right: immediately after my son's disclosure, we looked for new places to live in town, and happily enough, we did not move since that would have meant a lot of money, just before my husband lost his job. A judge has prohibited my father-in-law to approach me, my husband or the kids, BUT.. he has not forbidden him to live in his own home... so every time I use the elevator or get out of the building, I pray no to have to see him around, especially because our sons believe he is already in jail.... When the molester arrives in his car, I can recognize the engine's particular sound and I freeze. Thank you for all your help, my husband is just coming back from the playground with the kids (he made his best to recover to accompany the kids). I big hug, I will keep you all posted. Thanks again, Naive!
First, it's tough to keep up the "grandpa's in jail" story; the odds of running into him are too high. Can you work with your sons' therapist to think of a way to edit the story a bit -- maybe you could say that grandpa WAS in jail, and a judge has to decide if he will have to go back?
Second: are yelling and silence the only ways your husband is abusive? Do what you need to do to keep yourself and your sons safe.
I'm sorry also for what your marriage is going through and my marriage suffered also for at least the first six to eight months. What seemed to help us was doing parent interactive therapy with our daughter it is great for teaching parenting skills and strengthening the relationship. My daughter did not do well in play therapy and does not want to talk about anything that happened so this is a good alternative to dealing with what she is not ready to deal with. She is now four. So I guess collaborating with the kids healing has been good. Also my husband had a lot of stress starting a new job and we had just moved to a new state so he really couldn't take in all the emotions I had going on and do what he needed to provide. Perhaps with your husband losing his job you could entertain moving to a new area far away from them. I was a wreck being in the same town. One saving grace is that we moved so far away there is no chance of running into them and I feel safe out and about. God has a plan and perfect timing. My husband was unemployed when we had my daughter and it was such a blessing because I had help at home with the kids and looking back I'm glad because the boys would have been over at the grandparents more if it wasn't for that. I also had three kids in three years and I'm sure you like me were very grateful to get much needed help from them never dreaming the danger your sons were in.
We've struggled also with how to tell our kids and what especially when they are so young. But that will sort itself out above all they need to know they are safe. You and daddy will keep them safe. A counselor told me to let me daughter know everyday that she is safe, she will be with only me to day, mommy won't hurt you. These statements seem to reassure my daughter and I still tell her regularly. I'm very glad your children are doing well in counseling that is a huge part of this getting better and moving forward. I also went to counseling which for the first months was all I could do to hang on. It gave me a place to talk about the marriage struggles and get the support I wasn't getting in my marriage. My husband is much more supportive now but it took a while.
Praying the living situation can be changed soon and for direction on a new job. Remember your husband is carrying a huge burden and he may not be able to handle all points of the abuse right now. He may have to just move forward for now and then at a later time work through his feelings on the abuse. I went through a huge period of mistrust for my husband also because of the betrayal. There are alot of dynamics going on right now. If you need to vent this is a safe place to do it. We are over a year out and things have gotten better in our family but it is still a huge source of grief I still contend with and I expect that it may be that way for a while and thats okay. One day at a time.
Thank you once again for your advice and support. Yes, you are so right, it will be hard to keep up the story of "grandfather is in jail" to my son, who is so perceptive. And, besides this, we have never ever lied to him or his brothers, and I think this has been key to him disclosing the abuse. So what I am planning to do - if we ever see him in person again - is to tell my eldest that, after spending some time in prison, his grandpa has already been punished for what he did and that he is now out, SURVEYED by the police and receiving treatment to heal this "illness" - as we call it - that avoids him from staying close to any child, not only him or his brother. Anyhow, yes, going away from here seems like a sensible option, especially for my husband. We have some plans about that... and keep crossing fingers. About my husband being abusive, he is a passive-agressive person who has, very seemingly, been also abused by my father-in-law, his dad, when he was my eldest's same age (my mother in law always used to tell me how my husband's personality had radically changed from 4 to 5 years old... from a happy, open toddler and pre-schooler into a shy, fearful little boy with lots of problems at school (concentration deficit, bullied all the time by colleagues, and so on...). But my husband says he does not remember anything about that... and that he will only work on that issue after the judgement of my father-in-law (something very convenient for my father in law, since his lawyer will argue that he was a non abusive, caring and trustable father for my husband...). I have heard of cases of amnesia regarding child sexual abuse, and I am sure my husband is blocking everything about his past as a coping strategy... he has so evident emotional problems, he cannot share his feelings with me or anyone else, and is lost about parenting, just because he had no role models to learn about that (long story....) My husband is not physically aggressive, if he were, he would be out of my house, and for ever, the very minute, and he knows that. His aggressions, as I said, are passive, but he has been improving steadily and we are giving our marriage a second chance, for us, but especially for the sake of our three little musketeers... Thank you once again, Naive1, for your answers. A big hug!
First of all, thank you for sharing your story. I know how much it hurts to go over the same issue and to share. I am so terribly sorry for what happened to your little Princess... How can? Who creates those monsters? When I hold my kids' little hands, when I see them running around the house in their pajamas, I wonder: how could anyone feel anything but tenderness, love, and a protective instinct towards them?
As it happened with Naive1's posts, Heart, your message has been so helpful to me and my husband... I forgot to tell Naive1 that I am reading (though I am editing some paragraphs or comments regarding himself :O) parts of this posts to my husband. He feels comforted by your words and experiences... HeartSadx3's story has touched us directly because our cases are so similar (but happily enough the abuser was not your biological father, Heart! You trusted and loved him, but your blood and your kids' blood is not the same as the abuser's... imagine my father-in-law raping his own blood! the sons of HIS own son!). Well, Heart, your advice is great, especially about the alternatives for therapy.
The disclosure of my second-one came some weeks after my eldest's. He started by telling me that he had been hurt by my father in law "here and here" and I just thought: this is impossible, he seldom stayed with him, with the exception of... and then I remembered the week I spend in hospital when delivering my third son... and then, again, I remembered that my pregnancy had been super complicated and I had to stay in hospital for some days taking antibiotics... and they stayed with my mother-in-law .. and the abuser. How could the abuser do that? Taking advantage of my being fighting for my baby's life in hospital and abusing his grandchildren? How could he participate of their birthday parties that I organised with so much love, take them to Church,,, and a few days later, rape them?
The police and therapist seem far less concerned about my second one, because he is "too young" and will recover sooner, and because well, the rape was... you know, a little bit "lighter" than with his elder brother. And I am not talking about just fondling, if you know what I mean. I had the intuition that not paying the same attention to number two would be a great mistake, especially when his elder brother confirmed having witnessed some of the abuses (heart breaking details, imagine my eldest not being able to protect his baby brother, hearing him crying and asking for help while his grandpa abused him, locked in the bathroom...). I have seen in Mosac.net that siblings need to be taken seriously, victims or not. So, Heart, good that you are also concerned about your two sons... they are secondary victims, if not (God protect them) first-grade victims. It seems my father-in-law used one grandson against the other, creating rivalry between a then 3 years old and a 2 years old. He they didn't what he was forcing them to do, he would shut up one, then the other... and all what they needed was some love and attention while their mother was in hospital...
What brings me to a big question: Heart, what was the reaction of your mother regarding the abuse of her grandchildren? Has she suffered from parental alienation syndrome and decided to support the molester? Or is she supporting you and your children? My mother-in-law, that had been so arrogant, controllying and invasive with me, has decided to abandon her own son, my husband, to pay the fees of the most expensive lawyer in town (she is very well-connected) and sent messages to my husband saying that she has fallen sick because of our fault... What is worse: when we confronted her, she accused ME of.... "inventing" the abuse... what for? I do not know... how dare she? I had just given birth to my third baby, was suffering from post-partum complications (3 C-sections in 3 years) and my scar had opened because of two much effort while bathing my elder children (of course, no help from her, just criticism... and when she SAID she was helping, my kids were in fact being raped on her bed, in her bathroom, and even in her kitchen floor... ). Where was she all the time? Where?
And I have not told you the worst of all, and I am scared of sharing this with you since my own parents have not been able to stand such a horrible reality: my father-in-law used my then 3 years old eldest son for at least two sessions of group sex, with men and women, and was forced to perform sexual acts on them while was being filmed. Sorry, I cannot continue. I was in hospital at the time, as I said. And that is what he did with him.
You are right to be suspect about your husband's past, and how terribly ironic that your MIL is willing to acknowledge a change in your husband, but not what is now a glaringly obvious reason for that change! How tragic for your husband. There's excellent work about memories of abuse by this researcher:
http://www.jimhopper.com/memory/
You may want to look through the jimhopper site first by yourself in case the info it contains is be too difficult for your husband to confront directly at the moment.
If your FIL did abuse your dear husband, it's noteworthy that he apparently stopped when your husband was the same age as your oldest son. Often these monsters repeat a pattern, which is why we have to assume it will continue unless they are caged and kept from society forever. In fact, as a teacher myself, I have now learned to look very skeptically at behavior disorders in my students; I wonder what is behind them beyond "brain chemistry." As we all know, change is usually a slow and painful process for people -- think how obstinately we often insist upon repeating mistakes (overeating, procrastinating, etc.) rather than to change for the "better"!! Radical changes have radical causes.
I'm so glad others have joined in this thread. You may find you have more in common with one parent than with others, and you can be in touch through private messages as well. But while we all have experienced this crime differently -- different relationships to perpetrators, or no relationship at all, etc. -- our individual reactions and, in many ways, our individual paths to healing have been remarkably similar. There's a lot of wisdom and empathy to go around here. Unfortunately, someone we haven't met here yet is just about to discover a need for this group, and to discover just how strong she or he can be.
I'm glad your husband is feeling some comfort from what I have said to you. This is a nightmare, and anyone who loves his/her children understands that.
I can't say for your MIL because her reactions just don't make any sense. Nor do my own mom's. After a year she finally contacted me (I had called the police and she and step-dad were interviewed) I told her the details of what my daughter had disclosed and she said that I was lying. She has continued to support my step dad despite the computer evidence where he is doing searches about my daughter and having sex with children. All I can say is that it is common. Many here have cut off from unsupportive family members and for us right now we have had to do that with most of my family. My own father when I told him told me I needed to get over it and that I was making to big of deal of it. I know crazy but my dad has never been there for me and is an alcoholic so really no loss there for me or my kids. We can do without what we never had to begin with.
My step-dad had molested me when I was thirteen we had been through therapy (separately) when I was thirty and having my own children. He claimed it was a mistake to my knowledge nobody else had come forward about abuse in all the years after and my own brothers said he had not abused them. It was hard but I believed that he was being truthful although with my therapist we did setup boundaries where he was not allowed to bathe or change the kids or have them on his lap or to be alone with them. I had my boys first and then my girl even though I never fully trusted him I couldn't imagine he would do what he did to my daughter she was just out of diapers. Partly because I was much older when the abuse happened to me. So it disspells the idea of a certain age or sex. There is just no way of knowing and I do think that availability plays a huge factor into who they will abuse which is why I still worry about my boys.
One series of books that I really liked and you can get for your kids is called The Story of Me and there is one more for sure that I have gotten. It explains what sex is for and why God created it. It talks about good touch bad touch. But mostly promotes the good. One thing my first therapist said is you have to explain the good before you can explain the perversion of it which is what they got from your FIL. Again I'm so glad they are responding so well to therapy because you have not only stopped the abuse but you are giving your sons a chance to heal and the best chance of not having the issues your husband has or worse. I hope that in time your husband can heal too. And yes it is very common for kids to not remember abuse or repress it. Which is what I think my daughter is doing although I think she still remembers now. I don't think it makes it easier although I've been told that also because their brain has been programmed with information that they should not have at a very young age. That doesn't go away it can only be counter balanced with the correct information and as they grow and hit developmental places they may need to work on it some more. You can make it through this and your marriage can survive. You are under unusual stress that in time will subside to a point where it is more manageable on your marriage. Do your best to not attack each other because the anger and feelings this brings up is so powerful it is easy to turn it against each other because who else can you? I know I was very sensitive to ANYTHING my husband said about the abuse if he was in anyway dismissive or unsupported. It was like I could turn on him in a minute so the momma bear in me came out in full force and I had to learn to not do that to my husband. I needed his support attacking or putting him down for what he was thinking or saying was not helpful to him or us or our children. So if I felt frustrated enraged or disgusted I just posted here my feelings. I knew I could always count on being supported. I also talked to my therapist. If you have experienced other traumas in your life and I have this can certainly cause PTSD post traumatic stress disorder which has a whole host of problems in processing traumatic events such as this. I have been finding alot of help in looking at PTSD treatments and tools to combat the intensity this situation has brought up in me. One of the ones I have just started looking at is DBT therapy. You might youtube some videos especially helpful is the part on distress tolerance. Ways you can deal with the stress and not make the situation worse by spending (my new favorite but at thrift stores), alcohol, anger or other damaging ways of handling the stress. I also have learned to be more present with my kids...quite honestly if I am doing anything it takes all of my brain I can't think about this stuff which is so traumatic and play at the park or finish school work. I have to set it aside and fully engage in the moment usually for fifteen minutes or so depending on my interest level. But fifteen minutes is a good goal. Also do self care as much as you can.