A compassionate approach to healing childhood sexual abuse
by Karen A. Duncan, M.A., LMFT, LSW

Demystifying Childhood Sexual Abuse: Did You Know?

1. Family danger is the real risk to children - people in the family or close to the family are the most frequent perpetrators of childhood sexual abuse.
2. Multiple perpetrators in a family are not uncommon placing children at risk for more than one kind of sexual abuse by more than one person throughout their childhood and adolescence.
3. Sexual abuse can occur within generations of families by the same family perpetrator who can molest several children over a number of years and continue the sexual abuse into some children's adult lives.
4. Child sexual abuse causes a "traumatic pathway" to other interpersonal traumas that places women and their children at-risk for future violence.
5. Experiencing the trauma of sexual abuse is a factor in prolonging and intensifying post-partum depression placing both mothers and infants at-risk for attachment disorder--difficulty bonding and emotionally connecting with their children which increases the likelihood of child neglect and abuse.
6. Depending on the specific crime of sexual abuse they are convicted for a sex offender may be off the Sex Offender Registry within ten years.
7. Statutes of limitations in most states prevent the investigation and prosecution of known sex offenders identified by women and men who were their victims in childhood.
8. Sexual perpetrators may begin their criminal behavior as early as adolescence and they often first sexually abuse their peers or siblings and younger children in their families.
9. Female sex offenders cause the same kind of harm to children as male offenders. While there are similarities between male and female offenders, there are also differences which need to be understood if female offenders are to be prevented from continuing their sexual abuse of children an teens.
10. While adult males remain the majority of individuals who commit this crime, juveniles also commit the crime of sexual abuse. Juvenile sex offenders pose a particular challenge to our society in terms of preventing their development into adult perpetrators and placing them back into the family where they have already sexually abused a child.
11. Treatment for sexual offenders is still in the developmental stages - some approaches are known to work better than others, but there is no treatment yet available that can guarantee a sex offender will not repeat this traumatic crime if given access to children.
12. Screening for childhood sexual abuse can help prevent the prolonged problems associated with this traumatic crime when integrated with effective therapeutic services.
13. When women and men heal from this trauma they restore their lives and stop the pattern of repeated problems and life disruptions that are associated with the trauma of child sexual abuse.
14. A life is forever changed by the trauma of sexual abuse. Child sexual abuse is not a crime of hate or vengeance - it is a crime of betrayal by the very people a child has the right to trust.