A German Experiment Placed (Disabled) Foster Children with Pedophiles

Since we cannot share news articles on Facebook here in Canada, I can use my blog space as a portal to share links to articles that I think should be shared. 

There's a NewYorker article with a similar title, however I can't access it, so sharing what I have found on my own: 

DW News
https://www.dw.com/en/berlin-authorities-placed-children-with-pedophiles-for-30-years/a-53814208

Not only were the boys wards of the state, they were deemed "moronic" and "underdeveloped." 

Wikipedia article: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helmut_Kentler

What Is Child Abuse? Part 2

Trigger Warning: discussion of child abuse, ableist language and curse words.

In part 1, I spoke a bit about what it feels like to be abused and the long term effects it can have on a person. I hope I made it clear it's important not to minimize the effects of abusive behaviour on a child - whether it happens daily or infrequently is of no consequence, it still hurts. In some ways, having it happen infrequently or unpredictably can be even worse for a child, as they never know what will set the parent off. If you want your child to grow up with PTSD, that's an excellent method.

In this post, I want to give more detailed examples of emotional abuse and neglect. I'm not focusing on physical or sexual, as those are more noticeable or obvious types of abuse most people are more familiar with. I'm providing examples I've actually lived through.

-Threatening, with words or gestures, to hit or kill your child
-Giving your child the silent treatment
-Comments on their physical appearance: ugly, dirty, fat, smelly
-Comments on their character: stupid, lazy, idiot, useless, piece of shit, can't do anything right
-Comparisons to other people: "why can't you be like ______?"
-Withholding food or forcing child to eat
-Leaving child to cry alone when upset or hurt
-Leaving child alone at home before a reasonable age
-Manipulating children to resent their siblings: "I can't do this for you because then I would have to let your sister have this..."
-Accusing child of things they never did
-Buying child gifts after losing your temper
-Never apologizing for bad behaviour
-Not allowing child to discuss home life with anyone; actively teaching them social workers or others who can help are actually the enemy
-Threatening to leave child forever
-Threatening that the child will be taken away

The last two might sound like something the child would want, but please always remember a child is dependent on their caregivers. They love their parents regardless of how badly they are treated. It is all they know and they cling to whatever little piece of love or security they get. I still ran to my parents when hurt because there was no one else. Sometimes a child has no choice but to go straight to the arms of their abuser, even if that means they will be abused for it.

It is only as an adult when I realized I was truly free and did not deserve to be abused that I was able to set boundaries. In fact, it wasn't until I had my son that I realized the extent of how bad things were, because I finally realized that every parent has a choice in how they behave and parent. My parents made very bad choices. I choose not to make those choices, and everyone can make the choice not to abuse.

I speak openly about it and without shame because it needs to be talked about and the shame is not mine. But this is all I can write about it right now as it was triggering enough for me. If you have questions or comments, I will get to them in time.

Again, if you see yourself or someone else in these examples, you can get help. It doesn't have to be this way and you can start to repair the damage. 

What Is Child Abuse? Part 1

TRIGGER WARNING: discussion of child abuse

I've never kept it a secret here that I was emotionally and verbally abused by both my parents growing up, so I am very much a proponent of gentle/peaceful parenting methods. While there are lots of descriptions out there of different parenting methods, all with the same goal of raising non-violent and emotionally healthy children, we don't often take the time to define what actual abuse is.

I think when people hear the word "child abuse" they think first of the worst cases you hear in the news; children who are so badly beaten or neglected, they get taken away by child services, or even die at their hands of their parents. Or they think of sexual abuse. However, that leaves a whole lot of grey area between the worst cases and good parenting. There's a lot that happens in between that is still abuse and we are so reluctant to talk about it, that children who don't see themselves in the extreme cases don't even know they're being abused. Also, friends of yours who are abusing their children never get called out because, "it's not *that* bad."

So let's talk a bit about what abuse is and what is can look like. Keep an open mind, as uncomfortable as it makes you, because it can mean that you have been abused, you may have abused your children, or you may even be friends with a child abuser. What is important is what you choose to do with that information.

In my case, I was never sexually touched or physically abused by either of my parents. However, I still acted enough like an abused child that doctors and teachers asked me if anyone had "touched me" or hit me. So of course, I said, "no." No one ever thought to ask me, "does mommy call you an idiot?" because then I could have said "yes." I never thought to offer that information because I didn't know it wasn't normal to be called an "idiot" on a regular basis.

So there's your first example: an abused child can act out at school, or they can be very quiet or "repressed" (as I was described). In my case, I kept quiet to myself because that was the safest method of behaviour at home, but I also appeared "happy" at school because it was my refuge from home. I could be somewhat freer at school. I did well at school because the praise I got from teachers concerning my marks was the only positive attention I got to feed my self-esteem, and I knew school was my ticket out of the house one day.

An abused child does not know they're being abused because the way they are treated by their parents is all they've ever known. It's not until much later, when I saw how other families live, that I developed an awareness that something was wrong. I knew I was not happy, but I did not know why. I thought there was just something wrong with me that I must deserve it. 
(It helped as well that my parents did not like me having friends over or going over to friend's houses, so that isolation kept me from knowing I was abused)

I have heard parents defending their poor/abusive treatment of their children as "infrequent" or "maybe once or twice." However, abusive behaviour doesn't have to be a daily thing for it to be abusive. Abuse can happen daily, monthly or at random spontaneous outbursts. Unfortunately, the frequency of it is not a measure of the damage. Abusive acts are still abusive even if it only happens once. If it happens once, there's the potential for it to happen again. The long term effects or damage on a person do not change based on frequency. It's still damaging.

For example, your house can burn down once and it's pretty devastating. You probably live with the fear that another fire could happen again. That's how a child feels after the first time they've been abused - living in fear it will happen again. 

I will use Part 2 to go into more detail about abusive acts that people don't often think of as abuse.