Learning that your child has been abused has to be one of the most challenging things a parent could ever face. Your life and that of your child is thrown to conflicting and confusing systems and often times the information you get equally unclear. Wynona’s House is here to help you sort through all the requirements, to help support and advocate for you and your child as you navigate these confusing systems, and to link you with resources to help you and your child to heal.
When you receive a call from the ECPO investigator telling you that you need to bring your child to Wynona’s House for a Forensic Interview, you will be asked to come to the center. Wynona’s House is a child-friendly response of all the systems involved in child abuse investigation, prosecution and treatment. Our mission is to minimize the trauma of the investigation by the professionals working under one roof, communicating better so the child doesn’t have to tell their story repeatedly and to start healing as quickly as possible. The very environment at Wynona’s House is meant to be healing for your child. There are toys, murals on the walls, and other things designed to help children relax and feel comfortable. We believe if they feel comfortable, they will be better able to tell all the facts and details about what happened to them.
If you have more than one child, first try to arrange child care for your other child/children. If you are not able to arrange childcare, it is helpful if you bring another adult with you to help watch your children while you are speaking with members of the team. There will be times when you will be out of the room speaking with professionals about the case and your child will be in the room with our playroom supervisor or other staff person. As much as possible, we like children to have people they know around them at all times during these stressful experiences. If you are unable to bring another adult with you, please tell us that when we speak on the phone.
The interview process can last up to 2 or 3 hours, depending on the complexity of the case, the questions you or your child have and many other factors. Thus, it is useful to make sure that your child is had a good meal before coming. If your child asks you why they have to go, please tell them that there are experts there to talk with children and that Wynona’s House is a place to tell the truth.
Many parents wonder if they should talk or not talk to their children about the abuse. We prefer you NOT to question your child about what happened. You have already reported the abuse to the authorities and those professionals are responsible for asking your child the questions needed to establish a case. However, if you child seems to want to talk about it, please listen with respect and kindness as they tell their story. Do not pry for details as that can taint the investigation.
If you need directions to the center, please click here for Directions.
Many parents worry that if their child has been the victim of abuse that they will be damaged for the rest of their life. What seems to be true more of the time is that if the children receive appropriate support and are believed by the people closest to them, those children tend to recover fully from the abuse they suffered. Thus, your roll as parent is extremely important.
Most times, children do not lie about or make up abuse, contrary to many people’s beliefs. While children are known to have active imaginations, young children especially do not have a reference point for sexual behavior. They are thus unable to make up details about sexual abuse. If you are struggling to believe your child because of any factor, please seek out the assistance of a professional knowledgeable about child sexual abuse. Your support of you child is the most important factor in their healing; please protect them from your doubts and ambivalence.
Usually adults become aware of abuse because the child tells them it happened, their moods or other behaviors change, such as demonstrating behaviors that indicate premature exposure to sexual behavior. Children, not having the ability to fully understand what happened to them, may make up stories that you know are not true. For example, one child who was being abused by his grandfather told his mother that he didn’t want to go to grandpa’s house because there were spiders in the basement. Of course there were no spiders, but it was the child’s way of indicating he didn’t want to go to his house.
Since abuse most often happens by someone known and trusted by the child, it is often the male breadwinner in the home, father, step-father, mother’s paramour, etc. If this is your situation, it is likely that you are even more confused. You likely love your husband or partner and are typically dependent on the money that his employment brings into the home. It can be hard as a mother to make the decision to believe your child when you will be severing your relationship as well as a source of income. If this confusing situation is yours, please speak with a professional to help you come to terms with your decisions and loyalties.
Finally, it is not uncommon that mother’s of children who have been abused were victims of abuse themselves. If you were a victim of child abuse and now your child is a victim, you could be having a wide range of conflicting emotions – guilt, denial, confusion, anger. This is a tremendously challenging scenario. You will need to both support your child while also attending to your own needs for healing, all at a time in your life where your internal resources feel already stretched to their limits. I strongly suggest you seek out the assistance of a qualified and knowledgeable therapist to help you navigate this difficult situation. Your healing may come strongly as you are able to protect your child from further harm and provide for them, the compassionate and wise response you may not have gotten as a child.
Child abuse doesn’t need to be a life sentence for further life’s challenges. Many children who have been abused grow up to be successful, loving, well-adjusted adults. By giving your child support, by believing their story, by providing them medical and mental health treatment, by helping them to go through the system, you are helping them to learn that the system takes seriously what happened to them.
In the best of situations, a disclosure of child abuse is challenging for a parent. Even if you know all the right things to do or say, it may still be hard for you to manage your emotions or your life for a while. It is a crisis in your life and that means that you do not typically have the coping skills to deal with the situation you are presented with. Please consider not only ensuring your child has a therapist to speak to and resolve his/her issues, but you may strongly benefit from speaking to one yourself. At a minimum, please lean on your supportive and helpful friends at this time.
Become mindful of how you use your time and energy. You may find that you are more (or less) tired, more depressed or anxious, and more angry or fearful than is typical for you. None of these reactions is out of the norm. As with most crises, the best response is to try to maintain some sense of normal behavior in your life and get back to basis – sleep, eating, exercise, self care strategies. However, if the situation affects your ability to function in core ways, (sleep, eating, work, increases in uses of chemical substances, or thoughts of hurting yourself or someone else), SEEK HELP NOW.
If you need help finding a therapist for yourself or your child, please Contact Us and we’ll help you find some resources in your local area.
We’re excited to present the “FUN STUFF” as part of the Kid’s part of this website. We’ve created several games and art projects which are geared towards topics of child abuse prevention. We invite you to use these tools with your children.
The art projects can be used in 2 ways. First, your child will be able to use an on-line coloring option to color the pictures we have provided. In addition, if you would prefer to have your child color with crayons or colored pens or pencils, the pdf files can be downloaded without color. Either way, their works of art can be displayed on your refrigerator as you demonstrate your pride in their work.
In addition, there are some word games that can be printed off and completed by your child. Again, the topics are child abuse prevention.
Please consider using these items as educational tools to have those difficult discussions with your child. For example, as a parent, if you want to have a heart-to-heart talk with your child about appropriate touch, you can use our pictures as a way to initiate that talk. The drawings will help communicate to your child in language they understand, art and play.
Finally, please send us any comments about how these tools worked for you or your child. We’d love to have FEEDBACK to further improve our services and website.
|
|
