Keeping Our Children Safe: Child Predators

I've always said that should if anyone tried to harm my child, in this way or any other, that he (or she) would be missing a significant number of limbs. I was once again reminded of this point today as I attended a child sex abuse workshop at my son's school. 

The video featured the testimony of victims, their parents, and the abusers themselves. At one point I literally wanted to reach through the television and strangle the bastard who sat there and detailed some of his exploits, including the fact that he had been abusing children since he was ten years old, and only got caught when he was 36. Horrible imagery raced through my head - the what-if's, the near-misses, who knows what. This is literally my worst fear as a parent. 

At first I thought the workshop sounded like a chore and I was dreading it. But I left there with a renewed sense of protection not only for my own children, but for other kids, too. And it helped me realize that even though a background check sounds extreme, or suspicions might be unfounded, you never know. Who wants to take that chance? I have nothing to hide; have at it if you feel that it's going to make your school all that much safer. After all, my son is just one of the many kids who will pass through its doors, and I'm glad they're doing that much more to make him safe, too. 

While I've had "the talk" with my son about this before, after this presentation I realized just how much more I needed to include in that talk. Like, not always is the perpetrator a stranger. Many children are molested by people they know, whether it's a friend or even a family member. The key point here is that the abuser often gains the trust of the entire family and community too, not just the child. So he (or she) has everyone fooled into believing it could never happen because they are so trustworthy, so upstanding - how could that be possible? Adults can often put blinders on to this behavior and ignore red flags and warning signs until it's too late. 

Which brings me to another point: not always are the abusers male. We tend to lump strange-looking men that we don't know into the possible child molester category, which isn't really fair: women can be molesters, too. One of the young victims on the video was actually abused by her female teacher. 

And not always do the abusers fit the typical disheveled, strung-out look that we might often associate with them. Both of the male abusers featured on the tape looked fairly normal, with normal interests, just like you and me. The one said he coached girls' softball for 15 years, played Santa at Christmastime, and operated a roller skating rink where children often congregated. The other was a parent who had children of his own, and when kids came over to play, he considered it an open opportunity to violate them. 

My husband and I are pretty hyper-vigilant about where our children are when we're out in public, who they're with and what they're doing. I've often wondered if I was paranoid or too over the top, but have decided I don't care - it's my job to be paranoid. Many times we've discussed different situations and scenarios that someone might pose, like getting into the car with someone, even if they offer you lots of candy or Thomas trains, which my son loves. Inappropriate touching is another subject I've recently broached, and also emphasized after seeing the video that it's not always adults, either, who engage in this. After all, the one abuser, as I mentioned, was ten when he started molesting children. His first victim was a five-year-old, the same age as my son. 

One predator admitted that he targeted children who met a certain age criteria and looked a certain way. I felt my skin crawl as I thought of my daughter, who fit his exact description. Another said he often looked for children who had a poor family life and who lacked a father figure, and typically those children are often lonely and seeking attention. Sadly, those kids' parents are the ones who need to hear this stuff the most in order to protect their children during a difficult time in their lives. 

Some takeaway points I left with and plan to share with anyone who will listen are this:

• Know where your children are, and who they are with. This reminds me of when we witnessed a small boy my son's age wandering around the mini golf course we were playing at the other day. He followed us for a couple of holes and then wandered off again, hopefully back with his family. How could they let him be so far away without concern? Were they even paying attention? I can't help but think this would have been a prime opportunity for someone with horrible intentions. 

• Limit access to your children. Whether it's through physical contact, the Internet (which is another topic entirely) or some other medium, there are plenty of outlets that predators are perfectly willing to take advantage of when parents let their guard down. The presenters also mentioned screening of volunteers like us, but included babysitters as well - people who we willingly let into our homes. 

• Know the warning signs of abuse, not only in children, but the abuser as well. Behavior changes and inappropriate touching are signs your child might exhibit, as well as not wanting to go certain places they normally would enjoy going to. Abusers might be people who want to spend a lot of time with kids and avoid adult interaction. They may also exhibit other inappropriate behaviors like wanting to be alone with kids or giving gifts to manipulate them. Don't always expect them to be overt signs like hugging and touching. 

One thing that really struck me with these people on the video was that they had no remorse for their actions. They seemed to actually be justifying their behavior, in a sense. They blamed the parents for not being attentive and recognizing the warning signs, completely absolving themselves of any guilt in the matter. One of them said he was only arrested after he turned in film to be developed that had nude pictures of his victims on it, and the developer called the authorities. One can ask, What was he thinking? The program emphasized that these people think the rules don't apply to them, that they are above the law somehow. Whatever the case, thank God for his stupidity, or who knows what would have happened. 

• If you suspect suspicious behavior, don't be afraid to come forward. And encourage your children to do so, also, if something happens to them. Talk to your kids, and, more importantly, listen to what they're trying to tell you. This sounds pretty obvious, but one victim on the tape was abused by a priest, and members of the parish had been suspicious of inappropriate behaviors leading up to the abuse. After the proverbial you-know-what hit the fan, they only then came forward to say they had suspected something. Well, where were you when all this was going on? I wondered. Better to face a bit of embarrassment than completely ruin the life of a child to protect our own egos and reputations. I could never live with myself if I noticed these signs and yet did nothing about it. We have a job as adults to protect children, and if we misstep by accusing someone who isn't really guilty, we can issue our apologies later.

Please bear with me ...

If there's anyone out there in Cyber Land who's actually reading this, bear with me: I've just discovered shabbyblogs.com and am jazzing up my blog to actually look cool. It's a lot of fun, but very hard to make up my mind what I want. 

Stay tuned...

The Breastfeeding Doll Controversy

Not too long ago I noticed another scandalous headline about breastfeeding: apparently a Spanish toymaker has introduced a doll that little girls can nurse themselves. It even comes with a special "sling" that I can only guess is supposed to be like a nursing bra. Who knows, really. 

At any rate, I have mixed ideas about the doll. The idea might be a good one, I suppose - but it is a tad on the creepy side. I mean, in this household we don't need to buy a doll as a role model for my daughter; she has me to watch feeding her brother every two hours during the day. If they see it at home, they will no doubt figure it out and try it for themselves anyway. 

I did a quick Google search, which revealed that most of the negative attention the doll has received seems to come from the United States, where negative attitudes on nursing often prevail. (One skeptical article came from the UK, where breastfeeding rates are among the lowest in Europe.) This is evident in figures released from various sources and published on kellymom.com, which shows that in 2001, roughly 65% of women breastfed in the hospital. At six months, the figure dropped to 27% (some studies show figures as low as 12%), and by 18 months, none of the women surveyed was (even though some health organizations recommend nursing at least a year, if not two, for optimal health benefits). The countries with the highest rates of breastfeeding include Scandinavia, Switzerland, and (what a surprise!) Spain.  Most people in the US would cringe or think it gross to nurse a child for two years - whatever. (Let it be said, though, that any breastfeeding is better than none at all!)

So...parents are "wary of the breastfeeding doll" and the possible psychological damage it will do, yet teen queen Miley Cyrus can pole dance for an audience of young adults at the Teen Choice Awards this month and that raises little more than an eyebrow. Yeah, that makes sense. 

At any rate, the creepiness factor I'm feeling might be from people who consider it a doll that teaches girls to breastfeed. Rather than teach, I think it provides positive modeling that might just come in handy when they're older (much, much older, hopefully). Who knows - in the right environment, it could help people overcome their hang-ups about boobs being just for sex (see my last post), and further increase the rate of breastfeeding, which is good for mom and for baby. What's wrong with that?

Can I Get Some Privacy, Please?

We're visiting the in-laws, and I just caught a glimpse of my husband and father-in-law out the upstairs window with ladder in tow. Good grief, I thought, please don't let them come up here. What are the chances? I finished feeding the baby just as my husband's face came into view. Can't a girl and her little booblet get any peace? Which reminds me of our latest family trip to Wal-mart. Of course, whenever we're there, the baby always needs fed. Generally the relative calm of a locked fitting room will do the trick, but this time my nursing session was interrupted by a rather inquisitive young girl who decided to crawl on the floor to see under the door. "What are you doing in here?" (since I obviously wasn't trying on clothes) "I'm feeding my baby!" I said, hoping that would be the end of it. Nope - she peeked not once, but twice! I should be glad about possibly providing a young girl to see a natural aspect of motherhood: after all, using the boobs God gave us to feed our young is quite an extraordinary thing! And it's not like I was out in the open, breasts exposed for all to see. You'd think that, after breastfeeding my third child, I'd have quite the knack for nursing in public (NIP, to those of us 'in the know' LOL). Not so! Of course my two boys were the ones who often ate the most, whenever, wherever, regardless if they had just been fed prior to going wherever we were. That would be the time they would just have to be nursed at the dinner table, during some important function, or whatever. And of course neither one liked having a blanket over their heads to conceal the goods; nope, they had to grasp it in one chubby fist and rip the whole thing off. Not exactly discreet. Thankfully I've never really received any horrid looks or been confronted by an offended passerby. But I outright refuse to nurse my child in a dirty bathroom stall where other people normally take a dump - that's where I draw the line. (However, our local Walmart does happen to have a nice bench in their restroom, just an FYI.) One thing I don't get is how certain people have a problem with breastfeeding, yet are totally okay with women walking around with half their cleaveage hanging out, thongs and tattoos exposed and on public display. Yet me feeding my baby (who happens to be a boy) is somehow disgusting? Please! Boobs are not just for pleasure, people! I've heard of people getting the evil eye (the "I can't see what you're doing but I know what's going on under that blanket!" look) for nursing, and really, as long as you're not doing topless dances on the tables, who cares? Baby is hungry; baby needs to eat! I've seen plenty of people shoving food into their mouths in public and find that much harder on the eyes than a baby discreetly enjoying mother's milk, God's perfect food! And I'm not sure whether to cringe or laugh when I see my 2-year-old daughter casually (but lovingly!) lifting her shirt to 'feed' her baby. Why discourage something that is perfectly natural? Hopefully it will be a positive model for her and when it's her time to have babies, breastfeeding will be her method of choice.

Birth Day: A Televised VBAC

This morning I was watching tv at my inlaws - they have fancy cable with all the premium channels I don't get at home. While flipping through I spotted a half-hour show on Discovery Health about VBACs and froze in my remote-controlled tracks. What?! They're showing a VBAC on tv? Skeptically, I thought it was going to end in the obvious way: mom would be scared into giving up her hopes of delivering vaginally and would be wheeled into the OR, pronto. I was pleasantly surprised to hear that the laboring mom had already had a successful VBAC and was now having her third child. Of course, doctors gave her the familiar warnings that her uterus could rupture, baby could die, blah blah blah. Not discounting that those things can happen, I'm sure she's heard it before, seeing as how she's already done it once. Granted, it was a half-hour show, so they could really only go over the major points: who should have them, who might not be good candidates, etc. etc. Her reason for a prior c/s was fetal distress, which is definitely a legitimate reason, but sometimes can be misinterpreted by a particularly overzealous doctor who is ready and waiting to slice you open. Halfway through mom's labor, an OB resident became concerned that the uterus was rupturing, as the baby's heart rate was starting to show decelerations. The patient's doctor came in, examined her, and thankfully determined that she could proceed and that the baby was probably fine. The baby was successfully born via VBAC, but was very blue. The minute they showed his little head coming out, I thought, Oh my God, he's blue, and was lifeless and limp as they moved him over to the warming table to clean him up. They would have to pick this particular birth to show a VBAC, I thought, meaning that whoever seeing it that might actually be considering one is probably sufficiently scared off from ever attempting it now that they've seen this episode. But something else struck a familiar cord in me as I watched this child enter the world: his cord was wrapped around his neck, just as my son's was. I sobbed as I held my baby and watched this show, not only for this fellow VBAC "sister," but also for what could have been in my own situation: I knew my VBAC was unsuccessful for a reason. While this woman's baby ultimately was fine, a healthy pink color and breathing on his own, I wondered if perhaps it would have been different for us. I try not to dwell on it too much, because, after all, I look at my chubby, healthy son and praise the Lord that he arrived safely. There are some points I wished the program would have touched on, though.

• Many doctors will give you the option, yet do everything in their power to dissaude you from choosing it, including the use of scare tactics and even harrassment.
• Your chances of a successful subsequent VBAC increase with each prior VBAC you've had.
• The overuse and even abuse of Pitocin (which has often been called "the devil's drug" in some medical circles) and how studies show that the chance of uterine rupture, although rare, was increased in those women who had Pitocin during their labors. The risks further increased with the use of prostaglandins such as Cervidil, which are used to ripen the cervix.*

This last point is the scariest, because it might actually (well, you would hope, anyway) force doctors to re-examine how they 'manage' labor. I found an article dating from 2001 that discussed how the increased risk of u/r might turn patients off from the idea of having a VBAC, but yet goes on to say how the risks increase because of the use of Pitocin and similar labor-inducing agents. Which begs the question: When are doctors going to admit they can't control all aspects of the birth process, and change their practices accordingly? (Even though the article is almost a decade old, the same ideas and mentality are still very much at work here.) Sadly, probably never. It's too much of an industry for some, which turns the birth process into little more than a baby-making assembly line where all laboring moms should fit the same model or want the same thing from their births; the idea that 'it doesn't matter how you got here, just as long as you did.' After awhile the "you" part of this equation starts to feel like you have very little involvement in the whole process and are just a vessel, prodded and poked and insulted like you're a piece of flesh that has no feelings whatsoever. The following phrase comes to mind: "Doctors will get down from their pedestals when patients get off of their knees." *It's important to note that some doctors, even against dire warnings to do so, will still induce labor with the synthetic prostaglandin Cytotec. Its off-label use for induction of labor can cause miscarriage, severe birth defects and uterine rupture even in women who have had no prior uterine scar. Doctors will sometimes use it because it's supposedly cheaper than Pitocin, and claim that it's just as safe to use. I'm not sure how many doctors are still using this drug, but if yours is one of them, please know the risks and then run the other way. Searle, the drug's manufacturer, has issued numerous warnings against its use in labor inductions, and personally I think doctors who ignore those warnings are throwing all common sense and caution out the window in favor of the all-mighty dollar.

Big, Fat, Hairy Deal

The old saying from the Garfield comic strip comes to mind right now. I'm doing a load of laundry with like three things in it because my son has not had his Very Special Crocodile T-Shirt for Vacation Bible School for the last two days now. So, because I forgot to throw it in with the last load, and told him it would be okay to not wear it one or two days, he had his picture taken with the group - and was about the only one not wearing his Very Special Crocodile T-Shirt. Man, I felt terrible. 

My husband told me tonight how much our son wanted to wear his special shirt today. Of course, I forgot, and pretty much insisted that another green shirt would do. And tonight at dinner when my husband tried to give him a pink bowl instead of the dark green one he wanted, my son threw a mini-fit because, I'm sure, he thinks pink is only for girls. He eventually relented, but not without a fight. 

I told my husband that the picture taken at Vacation Bible School today made me realize something: that sometimes, yes, it IS a big, fat, hairy deal, especially when you're five. Sometimes we lose sight of those little important things that mean so much to our children, and need them, in their infinitely pure wisdom, to remind us once in a while. 

The Very Special Crocodile T-Shirt will be ready and waiting tomorrow morning, for sure. 

Home Delivery is for Pizzas

I was already in a bad mood yesterday. When I got to the grocery store, I happened to park next to a car with a bumper sticker that read, "Home delivery is for pizzas," with an image of a stork next to it. 

I wanted to blow a gasket. I searched female faces once I got in the store, wondering, "Was it her? Is it her car?", which is ridiculous, but still: I wanted to know who could possibly espouse such narrow-minded ideas. Surely, as a result of the great abortion debate, the mantra is, "Our bodies, our choice!", right? I guess only in certain situations. If you want to keep your baby, suddenly it's not your choice anymore what happens to your body or where and how you give birth. It's as if you've handed over all your rights to someone who suddenly knows your body better than you do. Lots of doctors (although not all, let's not lump everyone into that group, I suppose) use your baby as a weapon to coerce and pressure you.

While I've never had a homebirth, I was pretty darned close to the idea of one during my last pregnancy. I realize now it wouldn't have been the right choice for me (yay, two points for Dr. Congeniality and mom has to admit she is wrong!) but, had my child been in the birthing position, I was seriously considering going into labor on my own and having my friends at the local fire station attend their very first HVBAC. 

There are lots of reasons why someone might choose a homebirth: a terrible hospital experience, fear of being pushed into numerous unnecessary interventions, or wanting to birth in a natural place that was most comfortable to them. One look at the crazy ridiculous c-section rate in this country and I can totally understand, especially after having had two sections myself. I haven't met a doctor yet who doesn't see pregnancy and birth as a medical condition, a clinical process that has nothing to do with your mind and spirit as much as it has to do with your body being an amazing machine, really. They offer little support in the process and do more to tear you down than build you up. They could have witnessed thousands of successful births, but the minute you mention the words 'homebirth' or VBAC, they immediately start pulling out the horror stories to dissuade you from making a decision about your own body. Yes, it's important to know the risks - but more importantly, it's key to have support in your decision. 

I got online to read the statistics on the safety of homebirth, and once again was directed to the blog of Dr. Amy Tuteur, an OBGYN. While not discounting any of Dr. Tuteur's experiences, I couldn't believe the sheer arrogance expressed in her blog. She claims her site, homebirthdebate.blogspot.com, is for both supporters and opponents of homebirth. But it reads more like a bash session against homebirth and midwives than anything else, and supporters are probably few and far between. At one point, Dr. Tuteur actually says, in the comments section of her post "and they wonder why no one takes them seriously," that "midwives lack basic knowledge, and don't like what they find out when they do acquire basic knowledge." She goes on to say, "Midwives aren't knowledgeable, they don't like what knowledge shows them, and they place inordinate value on their own emotions."

Midwives aren't knowledgeable? What? Isn't that a bit of an overgeneralization? The certified nurse midwife who delivered my second child certainly seemed to know what she was doing. No woman, or midwife, should approach homebirth without a lack of knowledge. I also don't know many women who wake up at 39 weeks pregnant and say, "Oh, I think I'll have a homebirth!" Nor can I imagine a midwife who says, "Sure, let's do a homebirth! How hard can it possibly be?" You cannot approach a homebirth or VBAC without knowing the risks, and the facts - not the trumped up worries of a handful of people who think you're being selfish or dangerous. Tutuer is trying to separate the emotional from the clinical aspect of birth, and in my experience, you can't do it. You can't deny that birth is a very emotional, spiritual process, something that many cold, scientific doctors are unwilling to admit or lend credence to. If midwifery is not to be trusted, and midwives like Ina May Gaskin are so 'unknowledgeable,' then how do you explain her success rate? 

Whatever the case, yes, there are risks. But there are risks to doing everything: riding in your car, going for a walk outside, even having a fatal accident within the four walls of your own home. It's important to put this into perspective, rather than fall victim to scare tactics like the ones Dr. Tuteur has firmly seeded in the brains of women everywhere. The what if's that might never be suddenly take on a life of their own and completely overshadow everything else, and ultimately, there are risks involved that might be unavoidable, even in a controlled hospital setting. Because that's what it's ultimately all about: control, and how countless American obstetricians suffer from a God complex and are trying to control a process that is still not up to them. What she fails to mention is that women still do die during hospital births and after c-sections, even despite our wealth of knowledge and superior facilities. She also fails to mention that the intrusive and often unnecessary practices of her very cohorts are what drives many women to seek out a homebirth in the first place.