Hi friends and family-

Just a quick note to share.  Shortly after Mabel was born, I attended a Parenting Safe Children workshop that came highly recommended on preventing sexual abuse and safe body practices for children.  It was incredibly informative and helpful…and I’m so glad I did it raising 2 girls (current statistics are that it happens to 1 in 5 girls). The instructor works with sex offenders and shared key insights into prevention. Geoff and I debriefed and shared all of the information. One of the most helpful tips the instructor gave us was teaching the girls the difference between a secret and a surprise. Our rule we implemented immediately after this workshop was that there are no secrets in our family. We don’t keep any secrets from each other in our family and we can keep surprises. [A secret you never tell, a surprise you always tell.] A child telling a potential abuser that she/he doesn’t keep secrets is a very good first line of defense.  I’m on instructor’s email list and she wrote about this perfect example in a post today, which reminded me to share this with all of you:

Sexual abuse requires secrecy. As part of the grooming process, some abusers “train” children by asking them to keep innocent secrets. (e.g., “I’m so glad we shared an extra bowl of ice cream for dessert. Don’t tell your parents; this is our little secret. Okay?”)  

Once the abuse happens, asking a child to keep secrets about sexual contact may involve threats 

“I threatened her. I told her if she told anyone about this, I’d be arrested and our family would fall apart.”“I kept his secrets and he kept ours.”  

This is exactly why I talk about the difference between secrets and surprises in the Parenting Safe Children Workshop. Asking children to keep even seemingly innocent secrets (e.g., “Let’s not tell Mommy about the cookie we had before dinner.”) can make it harder for children to tell should an offender be in the grooming stages and training the child in secret-keeping.

You may hear June tell you that she doesn’t keep secrets.  If she does, please give her positive reinforcement for that and let her know that’s good. Also, please don’t ask her to keep a secret from us; or “don’t tell mama/papa” regardless of the circumstances. We tell her that she won’t be in trouble for telling the truth and that we will always love her no matter what. 

As many of you know, we’re very open with the way we talk to June, and soon Mabel about their bodies and remind them that they are the only ones who control of them. The workshop made a profound impact on me and the way we teach our girls about keeping their bodies safe.  Part of the workshop take home messages were to recruit family and friends to be on our team – consider yourselves recruited! 🙂

Thanks for your help in keeping them safe, assertive and self-respecting; we couldn’t do it without your help too!

Love,
Beth and Geoff