On my Facebook page I recently asked people to complete the sentence, “We’re considering foster care, but. . . ” so I could hear what those issues are that keep people from taking the next step. It was really enlightening. You’re welcome to add your input by leaving your ending to that sentence in the comment section of this post and I’ll try to address it as this series goes on.
In my experience, the number one concern of people who already have children is the fear that there will be sexual abuse in their home. And quite frankly, if someone doesn’t bring up this concern with me, I bring it up to them. It is a valid concern and one that I take very seriously. I don’t think anyone who has children in their home should be naive about this issue. I want to break this big topic down into some smaller ones because I feel it is so important. In this post I will be discussion some background info about children and sexual abuse. In the next post I’ll be discussing how to protect your kids from sexual abuse in your home. For the third post I’m thankful to have a guest writer who is both a social worker and a childhood sexual abuse survivor talk about how being a survivor can impact the foster parenting process.
This is a heavy topic and can scare a lot of people away from working with kids in crisis. I worry that sometimes the stigma is so great on these children that good, competent, qualified people run the other direction. And sometimes potential foster parents don’t want to even discuss this because they don’t want to think about the realities or they don’t want to come across as unfeeling about the needs of these kids. These topics need to be addressed so we can make educated decisions about what our kids are exposed to and how we love those who have had their innocence so shattered. Let’s start with some background information and perspective.
What you need to know:
Sexual abuse isn’t the end of the story. A sexually abused child is not damaged goods. The statistics are startling about how many people have been sexually abused as children (which is why I’m glad we’ll have a guest post dealing with the uniquenesses of those people becoming foster parents). And those are just the people willing to talk about it. These people are our friends, neighbors, coworkers, siblings and spouses. We can’t decide that foster kids who were sexually abused are destined to be abusers or that those kids aren’t worth loving. They need our compassion and loving guidance to help them get the healing they need. We also need to realize that they did nothing to bring this abuse on themselves. They weren’t inherently more sexual than other children and aren’t children to be feared. While they may need help establishing healthy boundaries, they still need physical affection as all children do.
Good kids do dumb things. Sometimes sweet, loving, precious kids will make dumb mistakes when it comes to their bodies. They aren’t evil kids, they are just kids that make mistakes. They are still kids that need love and understanding. They need help. Their poor decisions do not necessarily indicate a lifetime of problems ahead. A child who engages in inappropriate contact with another child is not destined to be a pedophile, although obviously they are going to need a lot of supervision and education.
Sexual touching isn’t always about sex. Kids know as normal whatever reality they have lived and some of them will recreate that “normal” wherever they go. If that “normal” involves sexual touching, this may be behavior they continue to look for. This doesn’t necessarily mean they are sexual deviants, but that they don’t understand appropriate behavior. Sometimes kids will engage in sexual touching because they are trying to manipulate, because they want control, or as a way to get comfort. This is especially true for kids who have been institutionalized and didn’t get appropriate affection in other ways.
Not all sexual play/exploration is sexual abuse. This is an especially important truth for those of us who have grown up in blessedly sheltered homes. We can tend to panic at any hint of sexual play between kids, but it’s important to keep some perspective. There is a certain amount of sexual play that is developmentally normal and provides us with an opportunity to talk with our kids about appropriate and inappropriate behavior. It’s important not to overreact in this situations and create fear and shame in our kids so they won’t tell us if major things happen in the future. This is a great resource as far as helping you identify what is “normal” and what may be an indication of greater problems.
Foster kids aren’t all abused or abusers. While it is legitimate to consider the possibility that a foster child in your home has experienced abuse, that isn’t the story of every child. Many foster kids are in the system because of parental neglect, not necessarily abuse. We have to be careful about making assumptions when we don’t know the facts. In the same way, even if a child comes to you without any documentation of sexual abuse, you still need to be watchful and let them tell you what they feel comfortable telling you. A foster parent may be the first person to hear the full story.
Not being a foster kid doesn’t mean a child is “safe.” We have adopted internationally, done group home work, and worked with foster kids. It was odd to me to find that within the international adoption community there seemed to be a lack of awareness about the potential that kids in an orphanage setting may have been sexually abused or may have even participated in the sexual abuse of other kids. Many families preparing to bring home older institutionalized kids from across the world would never DREAM of bringing in a foster child because they assume the foster child would have negative behaviors and could be a bad influence on their children. These kinds of problems are definitely not unique to foster kids. Anytime you are bringing a child into your home you need to be aware and have a plan for how to deal with potential problems whether that kid is a foster child, an internationally adopted child, or just the neighbor kid who is spending the night.
*In our next post I will be addressing what you need to do to protect your kids from sexual abuse if you decide foster parenting is right for you.*
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