I’m going off-track today. I was supposed to conclude my three-part discussion about good sleep habits this week. But, I’ve elected to delay finishing the series by addressing something more timely and certainly more important. I suppose there is a thread of continuity with our series, as I have lost some sleep over it. And yet, the topic has a heft and a heaviness to it that no amount of good sleeping habits will remedy.

I’ve been reading numerous articles lately detailing what is happening on the Penn State campus regarding the sexual abuse allegations against Sandusky.

These headlines have caught my attention for two reasons:

The first is that I work with survivors of sexual abuse. Recovery from sexual trauma is a cause and a calling for me. It is an important part of what brought me to work as a therapist. So, I make it a point to keep a portion of my heart and mind attending to this problem—remaining aware of it in the public domain, reading and studying about how I may help people with their recovery in therapy, and educating others when possible about its effects.

The second is that I am a Penn State alum. I no longer hold deep ties to the university, but a handful of years ago I nourished my professional aspirations there with many hours of study. It is where I saw my first client. It was also where I designed and conducted a research project for my master’s thesis.  My research question had to do with how people adapt and adjust to different forms of trauma in childhood. I wanted to learn about how some people can seemingly “bounce back” from hardship while others continue to suffer years after the trauma has ended. Not surprisingly, sexual abuse was one form of trauma that I studied.

Some awful irony…

I studied at Penn State from 2005-2007. The allegations against Sandusky encompass more than a decade, but my two years at Penn State fall in that range. This means that, while I was spending late nights collecting and analyzing data for my master’s thesis about the ill effects of sexual abuse, those self-same, terrible things were happening on the other side of campus.

I do not have the luxury of imagining that what happened at Penn State was a tragic but isolated incident. My hours spent with clients remind me of the all-too-common ways we hurt each other, the different shapes and forms of emotional injury that we can sustain in a lifetime. So, I was aware that, being on a campus of that size, that there were a certain number of sexual assaults that were happening each week. I knew why a campus of that size needed a rape prevention program. As a therapist-in-training, I was a mandated reporter for calling in allegations or suspicions of child abuse that emerged during therapy.

My point is that I choose to hold a large awareness about child sexual abuse. Nonetheless, I find myself feeling astonished, caught off-guard, angry and hurt to know this was happening behind closed doors on my campus. In spite of my awareness, I still manage to be surprised.

Survivors of sexual abuse live with this awareness every day. They cannot opt out of their own stories. They cannot simply set it down. They cannot look in the other direction. After trauma, their recourse is to work on the very private, sometimes lonely process of putting the pieces of their lives back into a sequence that makes sense for them.

The phases of healing are multiple and repeating.  At some point, many survivors will seek therapy for help.  At times, people suffer silently, lives strewn with ill-fated coping methods and hardship that bear painful witness to their experience. And, many reach a point wherein they manage to make reasonably good sense of a senseless thing, and they go about their lives, imperfectly, as the rest of us do. However they handle it, I honor their strength. They have been handed a deadly thing, but they persist in living.

What I want

I want the headlines about the tragedy at Penn State to do more than incite moral outrage at the terrible actions of a single person. After all, if you exhaust yourself with indignation now but go back to your regularly scheduled programming tomorrow, nothing changes.

I don’t want that to happen because we badly need your help.

Child sexual abuse happens more than we would like to think, and most of the time, we don’t receive public notice that it is happening.  It’s not your fault that you don’t know about how common it is. Sexual trauma is often shielded from the public eye through shame and secrecy.

And yet, avoidance and blind-spots obscure our vision—we don’t want to think about it. We avert our gaze. Who really wants to spend their free time thinking about such an awful thing? But, we must take in this responsibility.

Children deserve protection

If you’ve ever tucked a child into bed, you no doubt know the importance of bedtime ritual. There is a hierarchy to the stuffed animals, and each must receive a portion of blanket so they don’t catch cold. There is the stack of books that needs reading, the favorites sporting worn spines and curled pages. The lights are dimmed, perhaps there is prayer, or a bedtime song, and a goodnight kiss. And, there is the call to check in the closet and under the bed for monsters.

These are sweet and gentle pastimes shared between a parent and his child.

It hurts my heart to know that there are very real monsters in this world, a cloaked and unexpected kind, of which children are unaware. They don’t know how to defend themselves against this type because they look just like you and me.

Therefore, we must do the defending. We must ask the important questions. We must remain vigilant. We must be ready and able to intervene—for if we don’t, who will?

I have thoughts and feelings about the university’s handling of the situation, and the response of students to Paterno’s firing, and the media coverage sensationalizing the “Penn State sex abuse scandal.” Others have written at length about these things, so I decline to write about it here.  But, I have yet to find an article that uses this hardship as a means of educating the public.  I hope that kind is out there, and that I simply haven’t looked hard enough yet.

Do something really good

If you do not have a history of sexual abuse or some form of sexual trauma, I am going to ask you to do something uncomfortable.

I’m asking you to step fully into the awareness of this problem for a moment.

We can do some good with the awful thing that we have been given. Instead of grandstanding or ignoring or moralizing or standing to one side, we can yield ourselves to a hard truth. We don’t have to mercilessly bruise ourselves with the painful facts—I want us to move even further past the point of outrage and grief into awareness and action.

Because next week, this will happen to another child and she won’t have a big headline.

Donate a few minutes of your time to an important cause—learn about child sexual abuse and its impact. I’ve included a few links below with some current information about signs and symptoms of child sexual abuse, along with some organizations and good causes that could use your assistance.

Ways you can help

Learn—

Some basic information on child sexual abuse by the American Psychological Association

How common is child sexual abuse? Some good estimates are here.

Signs and symptoms of sexual abuse

Important tips on prevention here and here

Frequently asked questions about child sexual abuse

Support—

There are some great organizations helping with research, prevention, advocacy and recovery that could use your help.

Stop It Now!
RAINN
Darkness to Light
Child Trauma Academy
Sidran Institute

Take some time to check a link or two in the list above.  Let the topic occupy your mind for five minutes. Ask questions. Give a thought to how you can help.

Please don’t look away because it hurts to think about it— bad things can happen when you aren’t looking.

A community that is conscious and aware is a safer place for its most vulnerable citizens.  A safe and happy childhood is a gift to a child, his or her future partner, their children, and the community at large.

If you’ve stuck with me this far through this very long post, I thank you.  I hope you’ll feel charged to support this important work.  I hope you’ll put your money where your mouth is and support an agency that provides healing or funds research on this topic.

And, I hope you’ll be thinking about this topic a week from now, a month from now, a year from now.

I know I will be.