stay outside of my line

After last week’s post on Grace Brown’s Project Unbreakable, the same types of questions crept into conversations I had with other moms: How do I start this kind of conversation with my kids? How do I know when I’ve said enough? How do I keep from saying too much? The most important thing is to have these conversations, regardless of how uncomfortable they make you. Kids need to know they can talk to us about the uncomfortable things. But for anyone (like me) who is looking for tools to use, or ideas of where to start, here are a few things I’ve compiled. (And if you have any tips, suggestions, or stories about what worked for you as a kid, or with your family, please consider adding your comments below. Enough cannot be shared on this topic.)

When I was a kid my mom used to play a tape called Safety Kids over and over. We sang songs that taught us our phone number and address, how to handle strangers, what to do if we got lost, and that if an adult didn’t “stay outside of my line,” (or disrespected our space and touched our private areas), we’d tell on them. You can still buy Safety Kids, though I’m guessing there are also more updated versions to chose from.

There are also games. We have one for our girls called, Safetyville, which is okay, though some of the questions are a little awkward to explain to small kids (like: If you find yourself locked in the trunk of a car you should…) But as long as you read the questions in your head first, you can monitor what your kids can handle, and a lot of the questions lead to natural conversations. (Clearly I didn’t do it that way. I just charged ahead and caught myself mid-question. Lesson learned, moving on.)

Sometimes our girls bring up questions about appropriate touching, usually following my repition of phrases such as, “Keep your vagina to yourself, there’s plenty of room for you both in the tub.” Or, I bring it up following their yearly doctor’s appointment. The doctor always says something like, “I’m going to look at your private areas now, but it’s okay because I’m a doctor and your mom (or dad) is here.” I usually bring the topic up in the car. We discuss what to do if an adult, or another kid, tries to touch them. (ONE has decided that she’d yell “No!” and punch them in the face.) What kinds of secrets are okay, and that we’ll always believe what they tell us. I can usually tell when they’ve had enough. Their eyes glaze over, or they change the subject, so we stop there.

I also asked my friend Yvonne Moss (rape survivor and advocate for victims of sexual abuse), to share some thoughts on how to talk to kids about sexual abuse. Yvonne was one of the brave individuals photographed in Project Unbreakable, you can read her story here.

Yvonne: Mom’s know their kids, and each child is different. With this subject, as with any other, go at it with a plan. The most important thing to remember is that a child knows how a mom feels even when no words are spoken. If mom hates peas the first time she feeds her baby peas, that baby knows full well that there is something wrong with that green stuff on that spoon. How? By the look on mom’s face. If the mom has a look of terror on her face when she starts this kind of  conversation, that child has predetermined that this subject is bad bad bad.  And if that child is ever molested, he or she is not going to want to come back to mom with that bad bad bad ‘face on’ and tell her that something bad bad bad has happened!  

The hardest part about talking about abuse is sharing it in such a way as to make it okay to talk about in the first place. And to continue talking about it until you know that you have succeeded! All of life’s lessons deem repeating, right?

 1.  I always told my kids that there were really nice people in the world.  Those are the people who smile at you and say hello to you because they think you’re adorable or sweet.  Or maybe even because they say hello to everybody! (That’s me!) This always make you feel okay, or even good, because it’s a passing thing.

 2.  Bad people often appear nice at first. But within moments, even the smallest child will have a ‘blip’ in their little being because the conversation lasts just a bit too long, or seems off.  To me, this is usually because it’s all about them. Not the child. And that wrong motive comes through. When a person who just loves children and is moved to smile or greet them has a pure heart, I really think it comes across. How did I teach that?  I’d say things like “If you ever feel strange around someone, you don’t have to listen to them.”

3. And then there is the obvious. No kind person asks a child to come with them for candy, puppies or to help! The common tricks abductors use to bait. I tell them that their mommy would never ask a strange child if they want candy.  Or come see a puppy. Or ask for directions. But I would say “Hi!  You have lovely hair!”  

4. And I always taught them what to do in case of an emergency. The main point being never to scream.  More children are abducted in front of people and scream than we can count. I ask you… what do you think when you see an adult grab a child and they are screaming?  I, along with most, just assume that it’s an out of control kid being grabbed up by an embarrassed dad or mom.  So I taught my kids to yell (as loudly as they could) HELP! I DON’T KNOW HIM!  I’M BEING KIDNAPPED! 

One thing about abusers is that they single out compliant, quiet children. Now if that describes your child, don’t panic! Even a compliant child can be taught how to deal with a bad situation.  If that child knows that there is such a thing as a ‘bad touch’ and that ‘bad touches’ can sort of feel good on the outside, but make you feel off or yucky on the inside… well, then they know how to sort that out.  Then, they need to know that they do not have to respect anyone who says something or does something that makes them feel like that.  Having permission to yell at a teacher, coach, uncle, brother, or whoever if or when they encounter a bad thing is the THING THAT WILL MAKE SOMEONE STOP.  

So, if you see that ‘freezing’ is a way that your child deals with fear… address THAT!  Teach them how to sort out those ‘frozen’ feeling and address them. In the area of potential abuse, teach them to yell back at the ‘known adult’ with words like NO. Abusers tell themselves that kids ‘like it’ when they are allowed to touch them. Being told NO changes that. And each mother needs to know how to teach her kids this.  There is no easy answer.  Not that being touched once, or being asked to be touched once,  won’t stay with them and that they won’t need help in overcoming even THAT, it will however stop years of abuse if they taught how to be bold.  

Check out Yvonne’s blog —> Yvonne Moss: Make-up, Skincare, Cooking, Organizing, Product Finds, Motherhood & Music 

©2012 CEK & YVONNE MOSS. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

 

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One more week until auditions for SpeakeasyDC’s Mother’s Day show- Bad Mommy Moments: A Storytelling Playdate for Moms! See this post for more details, or email Amy Couchoud at coosh(at)speakeasydc(dot)org for an audition time.