Message with Arpan – 30
Child Sexual Abuse- Healing Messages
Do not confront the offender in child’s presence as this might scare the child. Due to the fear that the abuser might harm him/her or their families’ children might feel pressurized to withdraw the disclosure of sexual abuse. Counselling is essential for children as well as for adult survivors.
With this we end our month long messages from Arpan and we would like to thank Arpan for the gems they passed us all.
Don’t you think it is good to confront the abuser in front of the child, so that the child knows that his/her parent is supporting him/her and that he/she should also be bold like that?
That depends entirely on the particular circumstances of each case.
Small children might remember the shouting and fighting much more than that their parents confronted the bad person. Confrontations can get physically and emotionally explosive, especially when the children are there and can be called liars and slanderers in full public view. It becomes a re-victimisation of sorts even if they do have family/societal support.
Exactly.
Also children can tend to take on the responsibility of the fight or if something worse happens specially if the abuser is a family member.
Also its a revictimsation process for the child because many details of the abuse might come up and can be a traumatic event for the child.
Later on the child could be told that action was taken so that the child feels supported, believed and feels some justice was done.
Very true. It’s a case-specific decision our experts say, and we agree. Some children benefit from open confrontations, most are even further scarred by them.