5 ways to protect children from abuse (that you can do right now)
Abuse prevention makes everybody uncomfortable. We get it. Nobody likes to consider the possibility that our children might be mistreated or exploited, but our willingness to swallow that discomfort and do abuse prevention is the very thing that will keep the unthinkable from happening.
Here are 5 things you can do to right now to protect the children in your home / class / group / team from sexual abuse.
1. Avoid focusing on “stranger danger”.
The overwhelming majority of child sexual abuse is perpetrated by someone that child knows and trusts. Well-meaning adults can miss the danger when they fixate on strangers who are statistically much less likely to mistreat children.
2. Teach children about consent.
Let children know they have the right to make decisions about their bodies. Empower children to say no when they do not want to be touched, even in non-sexual ways, and to say no to touching others. Children shouldn’t have to hug people, even family, if they don’t want to. Giving children permission to say no to unwanted physical contact, is a very powerful countermeasure for abuse.
3. Educate children about the difference between surprises and secrets.
Predators may try to convince children to keep their experiences to themselves by describing them as secrets to be held just between them. This is, of course, a perversion of secret keeping and another example of preying on the innocence and naivety of the child. We can counteract this effect by teaching children the difference between secrets and surprises. Surprises being a happy thing that everyone will be excited to learn about, and a secret being something that not everyone is going to love.
Some families go so far as to teach children that, “we might have some surprises, but this family doesn’t keep secrets.”
4. Teach children accurate names of private body parts.
It’s tragically common for children to report instances of abuse to adults who just simply misunderstand what they’re saying because they only know childish nicknames for their anatomy. Teach your children instead to use the precise names for their private body parts.
5. Trust your instincts!
Last, and probably most importantly, if you get a funny feeling in your stomach about a situation, listen to it. That intuition is powerful, and you should trust it. If you feel uneasy, check it out.