(April 19, 2019)
Diego Tapia Figueroa, Ph.D. and Maritza Crespo Balderrama, MA.
“If we want to protect life on this Earth, we can do so by questioning today’s dangerous blindness wherever it lies first and foremost, in ourselves… Everywhere I look, I find the commandment to respect parents and nowhere a commandment that compels respect for children.”
(Alice Miller)
Research on sexual abuse of children and adolescents shows that statistics on this crime tend to increase year after year in Ecuador: 4 out of 10 children are sexually abused. 85% of sexual abusers are in the same home as the victim or are very close to their family. They are usually: father, mother, stepparents, grandparents, uncles, cousins, older brothers, best friends of the family, priests, pastors, teachers, doctors, domestic workers, trusted neighbors, people with “authority” and power. The odds of sexual abuse double in families with alcoholics or addicts. Victims of sexual abuse are male (47%) and female (53%). The age of the abusers, in greater percentage: from 18 to 25 years (55%); and from 31 years onwards, the rest.
Sexual abuse of minors is defined as the activity aimed at providing sexual pleasure, stimulation, or sexual gratification to an adult, who uses a child for it, taking advantage of their position of power, authority, etc.
We also consider that sexual abuse exists when the circumstances of age asymmetry between victim and aggressor occur, which means, a difference of approximately five years; this happens when there is asymmetry of power since the abuser is the one who controls or has some kind of authority towards the victim; when the asymmetry of knowledge appears because the abuser is supposed to use his cunning, and when there is asymmetry of gratification. The most common forms of sexual abuse of minors are incest, rape, humiliation, and sexual exploitation.
Some of these behaviors on the part of the aggressors may consist of exhibiting their sexual organs, touching, kissing, or groping minors; obscenely conversing with them, exhibiting pornographic films or photos, taking photos of the minors naked, inducing them to perform sexual or erotic activities, etc., all to obtain abusive sexual gratification.
Sexual abuse constitutes a criminal violation of a person’s rights and dignity. In sexual abuse, we are not faced with anything that has to do with the sphere of sexuality. Sexuality is a pleasant moment of encounter between two people who like each other. Sexual abuse is only a manifestation of force and mistreatment, with which the aggressor tries to prove to himself, or others, his power.
Many people believe that because the child does not talk about what happened, he or she has already forgotten it. It is important to say that sexual abuse is never forgotten and what seems to have been forgotten, is actually “saved” and may determine the future life. The trauma of abuse does not irretrievably “harm”; what harms the abused child or adolescent is the lack of words, dialogue, and affection in the daily family treatment. The key lies in connection, affections, solidarity in the human context.
Neglect is one of the predominant factors for sexual abuse, is the most serious and frequent form of physical, emotional, psychological, and existential abuse. Abuse is protected by the law of silence and neglect, which keep the abuser in impunity and silences the victims. When the “witnesses” also decide to maintain complicit silence, the abusive system remains and perpetuates, being able to break only when the “witnesses” break the law of silence. We know that a child who is abused or has been sexually abused can survive without trauma if he is not blamed, if he is accepted as a human being who, like others, deserves respect, protection, trust, sincere affection, love, acceptance, and unconditional support.
General prevention guidelines:
· To ensure that children acquire security and confidence. Research shows that children who are beaten, abused, humiliated, disqualified are more likely to be sexually abused. Abuse, lack of dialogue, insults, and punishments diminish security and trust, and then make it more difficult to defend their rights. The children least prone to abuse are those with whom you talk and reflect, those who feel loved, understood, protected, respected, accepted. If the child feels loved, he will not easily fall to acquaintances who, simulating the affection he needs, abuse him.
· Avoid all forms of aggression (pulling hair, hitting, shaking, or talking to them in humiliating ways: “dumb”, “useless”, “brute”, “ignorant”; shouting, insulting). Not to see him or see himself as a passive victim of abuse, but as someone whose right has been violated (Convention on the Rights of the Child, UN).
· We must talk about their rights daily. Ask and listen without interrupting, without criticizing or judging. Ask to understand and accompany them with love and respect, with relational ethics, in their becoming.
· Educate them on their bodies and respect for the body (“my body is my territory”), for themselves and others. Teach children to take care of their bodies. The right limits. Teach modesty. Do not exhibit yourself naked in front of children. Teach them to recognize the different types of caresses. Genuine caresses are chaste (meaning, without erotic charge). Abusive caresses to children and adolescents have an erotic charge; impose the sexual anxiety of the abuser; they break the being of the other, that different other, who deserves respect for his privacy and integrity.
· Speak accurately about what sexual abuse is: “No one can touch or kiss your private parts: your mouth, your penis or vagina, your bottom, your anus; and no one can ask you to touch or kiss their private parts. No one should sleep in your same bed, or take you to their”. It is incestuous to sleep in the same bed with boys or girls, to kiss them on the mouth, to caress them in a non-chaste way, to make promises that confuse them: “we are going to get married; you are my girlfriend or boyfriend; etc.”.
· Learn to say NO; to set limits, whoever it is. Teach them that there are secrets that cannot be left as secrets, for example: that someone wants to caress their private parts. Children should know that there are people who love and protect them. Love, respect, and protection aim to treat them as people, as equals, to genuinely caring in listening to their voice and taking them seriously.
· Trust their intuition: “If you feel uncomfortable, get out of that place, don’t stay with that person, run”. Reiterate that there are secrets that cannot remain as secrets (when they generate fear, shame, discomfort).
· We must explain to them how sexual abuse can occur; under what conditions and specify to them what sexual abuse is. Adding that this is a crime and should not be done; and, that if it has happened it should be said so that it does not remain in impunity (and, obviously, urgent therapeutic help should be sought).
· If something serious happened, the fundamental thing is to believe the child, validate his or her word; to say to him: “I am going to support you, or we are going to support, to sustain, to protect, to love; we will not leave this crime in impunity”. To say it and to fulfill it, to be consistent with our commitment and responsibility.
· Telling the victim of sexual abuse: “You are not guilty, you are not responsible for what happened; you are not to blame; you have been the victim of a cruel, unjust, and inhuman act. The only culprit, the only one responsible is the criminal who abuses you”.
For their safety, giving children clear and concrete information on how to prevent sexual abuse and what to do if it has happened is as important as teaching them to protect themselves from fire, drugs, or cars when crossing the street. The lack of responsible information, and information based on social myths and the fears of adults, are what frightens and leaves children unprotected.
It is necessary to support children to develop their critical capacities, to learn to discern, to reflect, so that they can move, when facing a situation of discomfort, so as not to remain as victims, acting, for example: “I say NO. I escape, I scream, I run to tell someone I trust someone who can protect me; I have the right to say, to tell my story”.
It is basic: that children and adolescents feel authorized by adults to say everything; and what they need is for adults to believe them and fulfill this offer.
Tell him, “You can tell me everything; nothing you tell me is going to scare me or make me angry with you; whatever you tell me, I will never stop loving you, protecting you, and believing you. Nothing you want to tell me will make me abandon or reject you. You are my beloved son or daughter, I accept you as you are: I always believe you; you can trust me and trust that I will take care of you and protect you”.
(part II)
“The child is a person, a subject, a human being… The free and responsible word liberates… The problem is what has not been said… You have to respect what is engendered… It takes great maturity to be able to be a father [mother] because it is about being aware that this is not a position of power, but a position of being to give, and we have no right to expect anything in return… Our role is not to wish something for someone but to accompany them so that they can achieve their desire… The worst thing for a child is what remains meaningless, what does not happen to language, what is not said with true words… If a child was not raised in love but fear, he does not learn to love but to defend himself… Only a few individuals who, in their history, manage not to let the child die in them, manage to create something and move things forward by leaps, discoveries, emotions that they bring to society, opening new doors, new windows”.
(Françoise Dolto)
Children and adolescents are people, human beings different from their parents. From the moment of their birth (they are others) and that difference must be respected throughout life. What they need from their parents, educators, and adults with whom they relate is love, respect, committed listening, understanding, trust, acceptance; they need limits that adults embody, limits that contain them, that guide them, that give them security and confidence.
The sexual abuse of children and adolescents is a state of barbarism that must not continue to be ignored, covered up, and made invisible -due to cowardice, hypocrisy, comfort, neglect, or imbecility- and it is a crime that should not remain in impunity. The atmosphere of disqualification towards the child and adolescent by his father, his mother, or the adults with whom he lives, manifests the ignorance of the right of that child or adolescent to be treated as a human being, as a person; to be heard, understood, valued, treated with affection and tenderness.
We have an ethical responsibility to do and say differently, with consistency, so that this humiliating reality changes urgently, so that cruel and unjust abuses and violence against the human rights of children and adolescents are not accepted, tolerated, trivialized, or covered up. To stop criminal complicity with the perpetrators. So that we can jointly build another story in favor of the rights of the most vulnerable beings.
Brief examples of fragments of dialogues in several sessions with Juan (born, lives and works in Guayaquil, 35 years old, teacher, lives alone with his elderly parents):
DTF Therapist: Juan, what do you expect from therapy, from this therapeutic process with us? What would be your preferred future?
John: May you take me seriously. May the anxiety, anguish, despair, guilt, and feeling miserable and rubbish disappear. That it is not the same as always.
DTF Therapist: What would be different in your life if that “miracle” happened; what would you notice that is different; with whom would it be something new; what new Juan would you like to become?
Juan: I would notice that I would no longer have to pretend that everything is fine, stop lying that I am happy. Maybe I would like to live with a partner, have my own family. And I would like to be Juan, not an imposter; I no longer feel like the sad clown in the story.
MCB Therapist: Juan, please tell me: having sex with men most of the time, and with women occasionally: does it allow you to find a way out of that anguish that seems to rob you of your peace?
Juan: I feel empty, and I feel guilty. I come from a very religious family, I believe in God. I have not left my faith, although the one who abused me when I was 11 years old was the priest of our parish. By the way, when I accompany my parents to Mass, that priest continues to give Masses and communion to all. “A holy man,” my mom says; and I take a deep breath and look into nothingness.
MCB Therapist: What is the worst thing that could happen; what are your biggest fears?
Juan: to fall in love and not be reciprocal. Let my parents discover my double sex life. That if I tell my parents that I was abused by the priest they admire, they blame me. Let someone get pregnant. That if I have children, others may abuse them too. That I get some sexual disease. To die in a vegetative state. To quit my job. To get COVID. That I can’t quit my addiction to pornography. To let others murder me. That others get tired of talking to me or speak ill of me without me knowing. I live in fear of living.
Sexual abuse is a traumatic experience. It is useful to remember the characteristics of trauma, mentioned by Gabor Maté:
“When we have wounds, the body has a certain reaction to the wound. If the wound is large enough, it is to grow a scar. The scar is hard and has no nerve endings and is not flexible. That way we can become harder and have fewer feelings.
The seven seals of Trauma:
1. Trauma is not what happens to you; it is what happens inside you as a result of what happens to you.
2. Trauma results in a disconnection from yourself, your worth, your feelings, your body, other people, and the world.
3. Trauma shapes your worldview, causing constriction.
4. You override your intestinal feelings, which help you survive, due to trauma.
5. Trauma makes it difficult to be in the present moment.
6. Trauma changes your nervous system.
7. Trauma programs your relationships.
When you think about trauma, it’s not just the bad things that happen to you. It could be the bad things that incur the trauma. It could also be the good things that didn’t happen.” Reflecting on the violation of the rights of children and adolescents is essential to generate alternatives in favor of their cause. As UNICEF points out: “The scale and gravity of this form of violence against children must generate the design of public policies that promote prevention, data collection and identification of victims of sexual abuse”.
(See: https://www.unicef.org/ecuador/proteccion-AbusoSexual_contra_NNyA-2016_(1).pdf)
MCB Therapist: Juan, sometimes you seem to be very harsh on yourself? What do you need in your relationships, in your communications with other people, (especially those who are important in your life) to start treating yourself with compassion, which means “feeling with”?
Juan: I’m a perfectionist. I want everything to be perfect. And I try to convey that in my classes, to the students of the school. It’s what my parents taught me. I don’t know how not to judge myself when I do not do my best when it is not perfect. Did the priest who abused me have compassion 98iofor me? I am full of hatred, empty. I don’t know how to have compassion for myself now that I think about it. Sometimes when they look at me with respect and affection I may feel something akin to compassion for my pain.
DTF Therapist: Do you feel that you propose yourself in relationships with others: as a victim, as an executioner, as a scapegoat, as an equal?
Juan: to be honest, it depends on who am I with. For example, with certain casual pairs of men, sometimes I like to be the one who pleases and lets go. On the other hand, with certain women I have been with, I realize that I have been even worse. With my students, I try to be demanding but respectful and supportive. With you, sometimes, I do not know how to be, because I have noticed that you accept me as I am (unguarded) and I tell you everything.
DTF Therapist: Juan, you’re right. We accept and respect it. And, you’re right about the need we humans have to find people we can tell our stories to and care about. What do you think of this, of the need and importance of being able to speak, to say, to tell the significance of our history?
Juan: Exactly. That’s why I like to talk to you. I am telling you my story and as you made me notice, by telling you, I listen to myself in different ways; sometimes, it’s like I’m hearing myself for the first time, and I’m becoming aware of new things.
MCB Therapist: You mention that you would like to build a family project. If you do it in the medium or long term: What would you do differently, so that your family project gives you genuine and authentic joy, peace, freedom?
Juan: that’s a difficult question. Because I don’t want to answer what people expect to be said and what is pure commonplace. I am terrified of having children and that what happened to me will happen to them, that they will be sexually abused, that I will not be able to protect them. I think I would kill myself if something like that happens. I am afraid that my couple will wear out, whether male or female. I have friends who are either divorced, or have a double life, or their marriages are a pantomime. And, at the same time, I m excited to imagine myself with a family, not to continue alone, to leave my parents’ house. To become an adult at last and to do well.
Social networks: fertile ground to be exposed, vulnerable, and at risk.
The risk that children and adolescents face now also has another space that requires specific preventive actions and processes: that of virtuality.
These are times of social networks, of virtual communication. It is necessary to explain to children and adolescents (explain by informing, talking, reflecting, offering arguments) the risks of the internet and the different spaces of expression and socialization it offers: chats, Facebook, Twitter, WhatsApp, Tik Tok, etc., the clearer and more direct the message is, the better.
For example:
· Don’t make personal appointments with “friends” made in a chat.
Don’t isolate yourself from your relatives or friends because of strangers’ comments.
· Be careful and protect yourself from people who deal with issues such as cults, rites, sex, xenophobia, sexism, racism, violence, fundamentalism.
· Do not give more information than necessary, because it can fall into the hands of people who want to take advantage.
· Be careful with what you write on the internet, or the photos you put on the networks because there is always the possibility that that information will reach hundreds or thousands of unwanted people.
· Talking to strangers puts you at risk of exposing yourself to dangers such as kidnapping, cults, sexual abuse, violence, crimes, drug trafficking, mafia networks of human trafficking, prostitution, and pornography; risk of falling into these criminal networks by giving personal information to unknown individuals.
Do not expose yourself unnecessarily: protect and respect your privacy, your security, your freedom, your integrity, your dignity.
We must maintain our control over communications over the Internet, we must respect and enforce limits. It is not a question of banning the internet or social networks, but of stimulating in children and young people a reflective and critical spirit, a responsible attitude for their good use.
Preventing children (children and adolescents) from using the Internet will bring the risk of producing the opposite effect. What matters is the relationship we propose to our children, how we propose ourselves in it, how we want them to propose; they are the values and principles with which we live daily, the culture of good treatment (which means being open to dialogue) that is our permanent social practice, the dialogue that we have managed to build.
(part III)
“Freedom is always the freedom of the one who thinks differently.”
Rosa Luxembourg
To contextualize historically, culturally, politically (the social practices of abuse) of mistreatment and violence, is essential to reflect on ways to prevent them, to generate critical thinking, to seek alternatives and solutions. For example:
“In the end, everything is structured from the patriarchal system… We have a society based on capitalism, which has made competitiveness a natural interaction, pushes man as a superior being, validates abuse, and turns others into objects. Hierarchy works in all business, organizational, political relationships, and also in personal relationships… the belief that children are the property of their parents, an idea on which the greatest atrocities are committed, such as incest, rape, abuse, or prostitution of the daughters themselves… We deny what we are not able to assume. But by denying that, what we do is to push away the facts themselves, and we dissociate ourselves from them as if they were not with us. We lack the courage to admit two things: patriarchal culture and the human capacity to cause harm… We need laws, policies, affective-sexual education and above all, to make us responsible for the society we are creating, all of us. Let us realize that we are a species that attacks and competes, but also that is capable of respecting, loving, cooperating, and feeling pleasure and empathy”.
What happens to a child who is a victim of sexual abuse? Physical, emotional, and relational effects and impacts of sexual abuse:
· Wounds, lacerations, oral, genital, infections; unexplained discharge or bleeding.
· Fear, anger, hostility, guilt, shame, low self-esteem.
· Inappropriate sexual behaviors (sexual games with dolls, the introduction of objects into anuses or vaginas, excessive or public masturbation, seductive behavior, requirements of sexual stimulation to other adults or children, sexual knowledge inappropriate to their age, etc.).
· Uncontrolled behavior; self-destructive behavior, aggressiveness, and antisocial behavior; isolation.
· School problems, home escapes, criminal behavior, cruelty, suicide attempts, constant accidents, self-harm behaviors, self-mutilation; excessive shyness.
· Nightmares, excessive difficulty sleeping or waking up.
· Food difficulties.
· Anxiety, depression, phobias.
The physical, emotional, and relational consequences of sexual abuse are also a way to discover and act. More effects and consequences that tell us about possible abuses:
· Constant problems with authority. Lies. Escapes from home. Delinquency. Sexual coercion towards other children. Excessive submission to the adult. Somatic complaints (headaches and abdominal pains). Over adaptation and pseudo-maturity.
· Also: Irritations or discomfort in the genitals. Constant grooming of the genitals or refusing to do so. Pain when urinating. Frequent genital infections. Fear of being left alone or with someone in particular. Depression. Loss of appetite. Decreased school performance. Anger or hostility. Inappropriate sexual behavior. Escape from the house. Regression to an earlier stage of development. For example, if he already asked to urinate, he now forgets to do so. If he already ate alone, now he asks to be hit in his mouth. Demand to sleep in the same bed with parents, siblings, or other people, but to be distressed, etc.
In adolescents, some of the behaviors and attitudes recorded are:
· The fear of “Talking” increases. Early pregnancy. Sexually transmitted diseases. Increased risk behaviors. Alcohol and drug use. Depressive symptoms. Sexual Promiscuity. Sexual coercion towards other children. Delinquency. Self-aggressive behaviors. Gestures and suicide attempts. Excessive sexual inhibition. Dissociative disorders. Anorexia and bulimia. Fear of being alone. Inability to hold the gaze. Frequent fights and upsets with family members. Memory problems. Frequent and drastic mood swings. Concern about sexual issues or sexual activities. Distrust. Permanent sadness.
How to welcome, contain and protect victims of sexual abuse?
Taking care that revictimization is not carried out is the priority, therefore, and also, look for a private, safe, and quiet place where dialogue can be carried out without interruptions.
Keep the following suggestions in mind (and trust what has worked for you):
· Believe what the victim tells you. Kids don’t invent those things. They have a hard time admitting them and talking about them. Dominant discourses are constructed by silencing the sexual abuse of children. The adult has to listen to understand.
· Victims of sexual abuse need an available and comprehensive (free of prejudice) adult context, the creation of a safe, comfortable and reliable conversation space, which (see UNICEF) “guarantees their access to care services and protects them from both possible reprisals and the process of revictimization. In all cases, precautions must be taken to protect the child. This protection implies, among other measures, ensuring that it receives immediate containment and attention, and giving intervention to the Justice. “
(*) Of course, to be honest, in Ecuadorian society (in this local cultural context) institutions and authorities at all levels of responsibility -in most cases- are negligent, corrupt, little or not professional at all, and contribute to impunity for these crimes. It is what we can notice, every day, in the news of TV, newspapers, and social networks; as well as the evidence of the experiences narrated by the totality of the victims and their families that we have treated in therapy; and, also make the same description, other colleagues in the spaces of supervision and clinical intervention that we coordinate. A lot of rhetoric, demagogy, and politically correct discourses of the State, the Government, and the authorities of the day and zero responsible public policies, with authentic relational ethics.
· Never force the child to speak in the family context in front of the adult suspected of abuse, and never confront him/her.
· Avoid unnecessary questions. With young children, violent sexual abuse is assumed to be an accident. Avoid unnecessary details that will only make the victim more uncomfortable. In the case of adolescents, questions about the details bring them back to the violence of abuse.
· Reassure the victim that they are not guilty. Remember that the abuser has done everything possible to keep the secret, which may include filling her with guilt, fear, and shame. The worst thing that can happen to a victim of sexual abuse is to be questioned as if they were to blame.
· Make sure you get medical attention and feel protected. Try to explain that there are people who cause harm and who will have to assume their responsibilities. For young children, sexual violence is perceived only as a physical attack. So, take care that your questions are directed to violence or physical harm and not to sexual content.
· Reassure them that what the adult has done is wrong. That no one should abuse another person and that the aggressor should be punished legally. Explain that this is why the complaint is necessary.
· When the victim is not yet old enough to understand what happened, try to have an adult who accompanies and by doing so, become someone who follows the recommended guidelines. Also, explain that sexual abuse is not forgotten and that the victim should speak up and free themselves from the emotional weight. You should also know that silence protects the aggressor.
· Contribute with temperance to generate a transformation of perspectives for their lives, through the deconstruction of all the “logics” and justifications of sexual abuse to build new and different possibilities for the future. For this, victims of sexual abuse must be authorized to question the relational lifestyles with which they have been “educated”, the punishing, oppressive and cruel ideology with which they are oppressed. That they regain confidence in their resources and strengths and those of their social contexts.
· Seek professional psychotherapeutic help and support immediately with professionals who do not cover up these crimes and those responsible -who respect children- who accompany them with relational ethics, working consistently in favor of the cause of children.
· It is necessary and urgent to reflect, to create networks, to converse, to act. There are materials (books, videos, stories, etc.) useful to help create social awareness, prevention, and actions. For example: “Well, when someone does something to you that you don’t like, you have to tell them to stop. And if you don’t stop, then you scream very loudly until they come to help you. You must not let them hurt you”. (http://educagenero.org/RANA/RANA_Estela_Grita_Muy_Fuerte_cuento.pdf)
From the social-constructionist positions, we value the importance of connecting relationally with others through dialogue to give a different meaning to one’s own life, a life worth living. A permanent, curious, respectful, reflective, and open dialogue, with children and adolescents, who can learn to contribute and build a culture of good treatment, which means putting dialogue first.
We believe that providing trust for a transformative dialogue, taking responsibility for dialogue with differences, and conversing through questions is necessary for the construction of possible futures, with freedom, joy, and dignity.
We become human by telling stories and listening to stories; humans live according to the stories we build on the experiences we live; with dialogue, we accept the other and its diversity; we are dialogical beings and we build together new social meanings; we are engaged in construction of different senses; dialogue develops critical reflexivity and is creative action in the world to generate social well-being.
We conclude, for now (the dialogues are interrupted and then continue, they are infinite).
Note: A book that we suggest, to understand this complex process and the human, relational and professional alternatives is: Reynaldo Perrone and Martine Nannini. Violence and sexual abuse in the family. Editorial Paidós. Argentina.
https://iryse.org/prevencion-de-abusos-sexuales-a-ninas-ninos-y-adolescentes-parte-i/ https://iryse.org/serie-a-favor-de-los-derechos-humanos-de-ninos-ninas-y-adolescentes-6/
https://iryse.org/prevencion-de-abusos-sexuales-a-ninas-ninos-y-adolescentes-parte-iii/
https://iryse.org/prevencion-de-abusos-sexuales-a-ninas-ninos-y-adolescentes-parte-i/
https://iryse.org/serie-a-favor-de-los-derechos-humanos-de-ninos-ninas-y-adolescentes-6/
https://iryse.org/prevencion-de-abusos-sexuales-a-ninas-ninos-y-adolescentes-parte-iii/
English translation of Bruno Tapia Naranjo
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