To the Male Gender: Trust is Something you Earn

I need to get something off my chest...

To begin with, I started thinking about all of this on Wednesday when I attended my first training for the Children's Justice Center (CJC). I'm training there so I can volunteer to be a mentor for children who have been abused. I guess I didn't exactly know what I was getting into when I signed up for this program. I guess I thought that I'd be dealing with kids who'd mostly been physically or emotionally abused. Instead, the CJC deals almost exclusively with kids (ages newborn - 18 years) that have been sexually abused. In order to prepare us to be mentors for children who have had these awful experiences in their lives, we have had to learn all about sexual abuse: what it is defined as, who it happens to, where it happens, the physical and emotional effects that come as a result, and the list goes on. In the twelve hours of training I've attended so far (a total of 40 hours are required), I've already heard dozens of stories involving children and sexual abuse. As part of this training, we've learned that two major things go on in a child's mind when they are sexually abused: they feel guilty because they feel it is their own fault, and they feel like their power to control anything that happens to them has been taken from them. Both of these feelings that take place are a part of the reason why 90% of all sexual abuse goes unreported.

Going through this training has been especially difficult for me. It has brought up past experiences I've tried very hard to bury and pretend never happened. As a child, I was sexually violated by someone who was very close to me. I felt so guilty, so dirty, and that I was to blame. Because of some of the things I was taught as a child, I was convinced that I would never be forgiven by God for what had happened. Enduring this training this week with the CJC has helped me to emotionally deal with what happened to me so long ago, as I never have before.

In a darker sense, it has affected me deeply on an entirely different level.

Did you know? 1 in 4 women will be sexually abused in their lifetime.

In the vast majority of child sexual abuse cases, the perpetrator is a father, a brother, an uncle, a grandfather, or someone else very close to the child. How could the mother of any child possibly know who to trust if she ever needed someone to watch her child? Obviously if she thought that her child could be sexually abused by that person in some way, she would never her child near that person. But this kind of thing happens all the time--a child is left with a close friend or relative, and is molested or raped.

My point is: I've always had a slight problem with my trust for men. It has always taken a lot for me to get close to someone emotionally. In the last few years, I've had two people who have helped me with my trust issues, and I had made a lot of progress. However, with all of this horrifying information being dumped onto me all at once, needless to say I've regressed considerably to my former state of mind. It will take a lot for me to trust anyone again enough to love him and allow him to be in my life.

Obviously this training is incredibly draining on me emotionally--I'll be glad when it is over! I just want to start helping the kids. I think I can handle that part, since it will be just one person's experience I'm dealing with, rather than several all at once....