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))) !
...please begin learning all you can about drug abuse prevention.
When your child is 23 at time of disclosure, having shortly before that disclosed that she has become addicted to opioids, almost overnight you realize you live in a war zone. You're standing in a single battlefield, but fighting two potentially unwinnable wars.
My daughter took her first drink at age 8, during the year she was being repeatedly raped by a neighbor. She opened the liquor cabinet at her friend's house when no one was looking and took a big drink. During high school she made a big deal of being anti-drug, but she had begun smoking pot and trying cocaine at parties. When her vile boyfriend introduced her to Oxycontin in college, unknown to us, we were all on the road to ruin.
Now, nearly 30, she is two classes away from graduation, just as she was at 23. She lives with us and has been sober -- as far as we know -- for about two years, but she is so worried about relapse that instead of throwing herself into school and launching into the world as an adult, she has begun a Narcan program and continues to work menial jobs.
Had we known when she was young that she had been sexually abused, AND had we known the close correlation between child sexual abuse and drug abuse, we would have immediately had her in therapy for the sexual abuse (instead of for vague psychological symptoms and budding depression). Further, we would have learned everything about how to prevent her from engaging in substance abuse as a result of what we now know to be her PTSD.
I have to run now, but will soon post resources for how to prevent drug abuse.
Your daughter deserves to know that there's a link between sexual abuse and drug abuse, so she knows why you're adamant that she learn how to refuse substances at parties, etc., and why you're adamant that she learn non-substance ways to destress.
I'm sorry about the lingering physical symptoms. Is it possible that she just waited too long? She may not need further counseling for the time being, but you can remind her that healing is a process, not an event, and that a lot of people find they need to check back in to counseling periodically for all kinds of reasons.
Seconding Hopefulmama's exasperation and despair about the availability of good mental health care in this country, in this case for drug rehab. At first we thought we would have to wait a few weeks for a bed. The actual wait could be as much as 18 months. By then, we pray, our daughter will have been working an effective Naltrexone program, attending meetings, pulling her life together for that whole time -- so what good will rehab be? Ultimately, these are the steps all recovering addicts must take after rehab, so she'll be doing the right things and moving forward, but wow, could she use a place RIGHT NOW where she can focus on her recovery full-time, where she's able to get daily mental health treatment.
Anyway, update: after three or four weeks out of the house, our daughter finally said she was ready for rehab -- God only knows what her rock bottom was, but it involved heroin as well as sleeping on someone's floor with cockroaches running over her at night. I just can't believe this is what my daughter had become. After she called, we brought our daughter home to live with us, having all (parents, boyfriend -- who lives in another state and was not an option as a place for her to stay -- and daughter) signed a detailed behavior plan of what she must do, daily to stay. In the meantime, NO car, NO money, NO messing up.
It's generally going well at our house -- we are hopeful that she is finally ready to follow through and get well. Last night, though, we had a blowout. She is taking several meds on top of her Naltrexone to help with sleep and nausea, and took an allergy med that interacted wrong with those. She was hostile and yelling.
Part of the reason for her anger, though, is that I shared with her the day before something she had told me during the time her abuse was ongoing: that she was a bad person who did bad things. Well, of course that didn't make any sense to me, seeing her only as my angel, and completely unaware of the abuse (for another 16 years). But she hated herself from a very early age. She was shocked to learn this when I told her the other day (although I HAD told her about four years ago, but she was still on opiates at that point and couldn't think farther than her next fix). During her rage last night, she said "I have been trying to process that for two days, that i have hated myself since I was a little girl!!!"
The reason (and I said as much) that I wanted her to hear that was to remind her that there's a reason beyond any physical grip why she has kept returning to drugs. It's because she believes she is worthless, probably because HE told her she was worthless and evil, but that message was surely quite clear from his abuse alone. Her will didn't matter, her wishes didn't matter, her hopes were blighted as long as we lived across the street from that Nazi. I told her it was time finally to address those childhood memories head-on to reexamine them truthfully, if she ever hopes to break free from drugs and other self-destructive, self-sabotaging behaviors. To simply "stay clean" the way she currently is doing so is only to delay that necessary exorcism of the devil HE taught her to believe was hers. It is his, and she must no longer hide and protect it: she has to kick it the hell out and be free.
Often she will tell us now about some drug-related incident or fact and I have usually listened with concern and sympathy, but now it almost makes my head explode. She was on a roll last night, and I said, "I am sick of hearing about you and your drugs!" And I AM -- it was all she was talking (yelling) about, and to my husband and daughter that came out as sarcastic and meant to wound. But what I meant was this: "I WANT YOU FINALLY TO FOCUS ON THE TRUTH ABOUT YOURSELF -- I want you to look at the ways in which you have been a hero already -- all the good you have done, all the surviving you have done -- instead of wasting your brain space and energy thinking about drugs for another second. If all she is going to be to herself is a horrible person, why bother getting clean at all???
I desperately want her to report the Nazi. I want to be able to report him myself, but have held back because I was so afraid to trigger a relapse in my daughter who was still so easily triggered by the thought of his death threats. It is TIME to have that asshole hauled in for questioning, even if he walks away scot-free without any prosecution. I want him to know that my daughter is not afraid of him anymore, and is happy to taint his vaunted reputation with the truth. I want him to know that we ALL know. Even if there's no justice. I just want him to twist daily with the knowledge that the secret is out. And maybe, if we're very lucky, he will end up in jail. But I want to see my daughter take that sense of worthlessness, and heap it on HIM, and then walk away, at last.
About reporting the Nazi ---->>> I have been taking courage to tell you this for… years now, my dear Naive? OF COURSE YOU DO HAVE TO REPORT THAT F…. BASTARD!!! (sorry for the Caps :O)) You AND your daughter. But you too. You are also a victim, as you may have noticed. So you can report him two, because your daughter was 7? 8? when she was abused. There is even a legal figure in my country (in French they call it 'ricochete - indirect - damage" which even entitles you and your husband to monetary compensation as secondary victims. So if she does not go to the Police, YOU go for you. Sorry, your daughter has endured so much. But I can see she is not ready to make that decision. Of course, the problem is, you will need proofs to start to mess with the F… Nazi. Do you have any record of your daughters' reports? Please talk to a lawyer again. And please TAKE ACTION. For you and for the other little girls and boys who are still potential (if not already) victims of the Nazi. Keeping the truth under the carpet is ALWAYS damaging. You need this for yourself. And I promise, this will empower your daughter. She will finally put her anger where she has always supposed to: in her abuser, not herself, not YOU and your husband. I can feel a change in you since your older posts to these more recent ones. They are a red light to me: you are running out of strength, our at least, you are fed up of using your energy to walk in circles, and you are so right. Now, please invest your energies in the most difficult, challenging, still rewarding issue you can start: seeking for Justice. Putting the blame where it should have always been. You know what I feel (from the distance) that your daughter feels (without noticing it?) : What is the problem of hurting myself? Look, the F. Nazi did XXX and XXX and XXX to me and he is still ok and enjoying life!!!! There is an implicit right to hurt myself, WITHOUT CONSEQUENCES! So I must be worth nothing, since degrading and humiliating myself did not have any consequence to my abuser…. so me too, I can destroy myself - with drugs, etc - with no consequence! because I am already nothing".
https://www.nspcc.org.uk/preventing-abuse/signs-symptoms-effects/non-recent-abuse/
Thank you also for the helpful article about non-recent abuse. I am certain that my daughter is not the only child he has raped. Our reporting may bolster others' claims as well.
I pray so often that you and others here can get to where I am. I read what some have had to go thru, and still are going thru, and my heart physically aches. I so often wish I lived closer to someone so I could help in some way, other than to just type out some words on a page for others to read. Naive, you and I have been here a very long time. One thing that struck me that Three wrote is that your posts have changed in terms of revealing more fatigue, and maybe even some futility, and I have to agree with her. I think we can get into a groove where we feel comfortable accepting that we must devote every last ounce of thought and energy to making sure we are doing the very most possible toward healing and justice for our kids. I think there are some things you may want to consider in this new place or process you find yourself in. I'm going to type the rest of my post in Word and copy and paste it so I don't time out and lose what I have down so far. I'll be back...
Firstly, I think what the exact laws were at the time and state of her abuse, and what the laws are today, and how they relate to each other or impact the case is important for you to find out. It will probably make a difference in how you report. I can only give examples from my case, which was in NJ in 2011. One thing that heightened the importance for police was that the offender was a high school teacher—if the offender is in a position of authority it is more severe in terms of how police investigate, charge, and in the possible penalty imposed. After going thru freshman year in college and some counseling, our one son was both ready to disclose and concerned that the perp would try and work with our district’s marching band, so he disclosed to his high school band director, who by law was mandated to report to his principal and the police. The sex crimes detective at the time in our town was awesome and he worked closely with the prosecutor’s office sex crimes detective, and they really directed the case so everything right was done. I believe these detectives’ actions were a very important part of our case. The state division of youth and family services has an institutional abuse unit that deals with abuse within schools, so they also got involved and were very instrumental in the perp losing his teaching license so quickly. That was the main goal our kids had (all 3 of them were victims, but only 2 were included in the charges and the indictment since the oldest one’s abuse happened while they were on break hiking the Appalachian Trail in several states and he couldn’t remember what happened in each state, so prosecuting that would have been more difficult).
That brings me to my second point: establish realistic, attainable goals. The harshest possibility in terms of charges and conviction was approximately 6 instances of molestation/child endangerment with a greater than 5 year age gap on one victim and greater than 50 instances on the other (same age gap), culminating in 60 yrs in prison. However the judge may not chose to look at them separately, especially if a plea deal is reached. The result in our case was a plea deal, and a very liberal judge presided who decided it was all a matter of immaturity, so the perp got a suspended 3 yr sentence. The prosecutor and detectives were furious, more upset than my kids as a matter of fact, because we had extensively researched these types of convictions, and the things that mattered the most to us were: loss of teaching license, Megan’s law sex offender registry (this is a biggie—it puts all kinds of controlling restrictions on the offender, in our case for 15 years), a psycho-sexual evaluation, and supervised contact with anyone under 16 within 100 feet of the offender; he also has to check in with a parole officer often for those 15 yrs. My kids believed that the offender was not a predator, but a very immature and unstable opportunist, and that prison would result in his suicide, which they didn’t want to have to deal with for the rest of their life. So my point is to illustrate what kinds of things you want to consider, how the different possible outcomes may effect you, etc, when you set your goals.
Finally, to address how I left off in my above post. I think when our kids were abused AND disclosed as children, our mama bear kicks in and the diligence and energy it produces is endless, maybe to a fault sometimes. We have all kinds of choices that are available to us since we can make decisions in the place of our kids since they are minors, and seemingly from all the reading here and elsewhere for years now, our kids are still open to allowing us to hold them and hug them. But when our kids don’t disclose until they are adults, we have to play a very different role. We have no say in terms of the laws. Our actions and influence are tenuous, there is a lot more egg shell walking, we want to help and give advice but we also don’t want to risk shutting communication down and/or pushing them away. They need to be able to feel they are in control of what happens in their life, we need to be so patient in learning what they decide, when they will address certain things, when to bring something up, when not to bring something up, how and when to convey we love them so much, we can pass on info or research with a very carefully worded caveat that we just wanted them to have the info in case they may feel like taking a look at it at some point..… It all can be so frustrating and exhausting. But in the end, they are adults, and we can spend so much time and energy and emotion on them, until we just can’t or shouldn’t. There has to be a period there at some point, a cost/benefit analysis that shows it’s time for the period at the end of the sentence, for the sake of everyone, siblings, extended family, the marriage, the family system. Naïve, you have that goal to research and set for yourself as well.
I may have no right to tell you to do anything, since I have not had to bear even half of what you and some others have had to bear in this hell hole, we were incredibly lucky that our kids threw themselves into academics and music performance, just one of them needed lots of counseling and EMDR. I have not had to deal with drugs, sexual activity, self harming, and a whole host of other risky behaviors that some have had to face every morning they awaken. I just want to say that I’m concerned for you, and it’s OK at some point to say, “Enough.” You can email me anytime if you feel the need, you can tell me to eat dirt, but I’m willing to help in any way I can. (((Big hugs))).