Wednesday, June 30, 2010

Sometimes I Just Can't Imagine

This is not going to be a fun post. In fact, if you don't want to read about the vile things vile adults do to children, probably this is a post you want to skip. I'd probably skip it myself.

I just don't understand it. I don't, and I don't want to. I have worked with a lot of small children and I know that emotional abuse and physical abuse are horrible, decimating the life of a child.  I also think that sexual abuse is the most insidious form, the effects of which change the course of the child's life forever. Many years ago I briefly worked in the psychiatric unit of a large hospital system in Arizona. With one exception, every single person admitted to the Eating Disorders unit had a history of sexual abuse. There was likely to be additional history of family dysfunction, other problems and instability but those factors were a variety. The one constant was sexual abuse. With all the girls I have worked with in the past on their "behavioral problems" it is far more the exception to see a girl who has never been raped, molested and sexually abused.

A story broke in the local news this week. A woman was arrested for using her own 3 children to create child pornography for distribution. She sent over 1000 images to a mans phone with the intention that he would put it out there on the internet. She molested her 2 year old in order to photograph it. I can only assume that her motivation was money.
Here is the link.  Police crack child po&rn operation


For some reason, even knowing as much as I have had to know and learn about sexual abuse, this particular case has struck a raw nerve. I don't know why. I usually hear these things and have a wide range of emotions. Anger, disgust, fear. Such sadness for the victims. But that initial feeling of shock, that visceral punched in the gut feeling when you first truly understand what sexual abuse consists of, that was long ago for me.  But this case, I can't get it out of my head. Maybe because the perversion of trust is so astronomical?  The children in this case will be violated for the rest of their lives. These pictures get circulated over and over thru an intricate tangle connecting the perpetrators online. They will be altered to depict even worse violations than occurred in the first place. Perp's will edit themselves into the pictures so it looks as if the crimes were occurring with themselves as the recipient. Things I can't even imagine will be depicted. Once pictures like this hit the world wide web, they are irretrievable. In circulation forever.

The other particular horror I guess must be that it is their mother who hurt them. Mostly the perpetrators of sexual abuse are men and truthfully had I heard this story about a father I would not have been surprised and would probably have forgotten the story before the news was even over. But their mother? Their mother???

This woman. I just cannot imagine.


There is a special corner in hell.

14 comments:

  1. I was just getting ready to log off Blogger and your post showed up....couldn't wait until tomorrow to respond. I can't agree with you more, and I have also thought that to be a mother and do that is about the lowest. Your mother is supposed to PROTECT you, nurture you, scare away the boogie man.

    Vile is a perfect word for this. And you are so right about the permanence of these images. The Internet is a wonderful thing, but not if you ever want something on it to go away. It won't.

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  2. This post turned my stomach. I almost wish I hadn't read this as it hits too close to home.

    Everyday I feel incredibly thankful that I'm one of the few victims of child sexual abuse to make it to adulthood mostly unscathed. I had a great family support system and I wish I could become an advocate for families of children who've been abused in the most horrible ways.

    I don't understand how child pornography is able to circulate. I once tried to browse a bit online to see if pictures taken of me as a young girl had made it online. I felt sick just by making the search, but I really had to know. I couldn't find anything and I'm pretty tech savvy. How do these vile bastards do it and get away with it? When will the internet cease to be a place so propagated by porn?

    I just want to take these kids and hug their pain away. I hope someone is able to do it for them.

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  3. I really do think its worse when its the mother. (Perhaps its my own prejudice) I agree with the above commenter who said mothers are supposed to nuture and protect.

    Special corner in hell indeed.

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  4. You all know what Jesus said about it being better if a mill-stone were hung around them and they were drowned in the depths of the sea than to offend one of His little ones. . . What do you wanna guess she was abused herself? I imagine she was desperately trying to find some way to feel powerful and in control. It doesn't excuse her, not one tiny jot or tittle, but I'm sure she probably had a horrible child hood herself. Which to me just illustrated why we need to get to the kids who have been broken and hurt and help them heal before the cycle continues.

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  5. Im sitting here its 6.30am, my babies are all both still asleep and Ive had to read this 3 times to get a line on it...not cause Im still half asleep but because Im in shock....I just cant imagine what she must of been thinking, and the 3 children... how do you move on and heal from all of that....

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  6. Poor kids. If they are lucky, someone will accept them just as they are and help them do the very best they can. Poor, poor babies.

    Essie, I think you are quite right about that special place in Hell....

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  7. Is it callousness that this doesn't either surprise me or shock me?

    Despicable.Deplorable.Loathsome.Etc. But surprising? No. :(

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  8. the tragedies that are inflicted upon children by their parents makes me beyond angry. It takes me back to wishing that there was some regulation/requirments for people to be parents. But I won't even go there today. I hope those kids are safe tonight.

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  9. I agree...and it is so disturbing b/c it is their mother that would do this. I can't even fathom how a mom could do that.

    I have thought about this often, as our boys mother suffered a lot of horific things as a result of her own mother...it hits pretty close to home...and gives me a deep sympathy for her I may not would have otherwise.

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  10. I know how terrible. But then i think...wow, what must have happened to them when they were little to do that now?

    or maybe they are just plain insane. went crazy somehow? or had been going crazy for some long time and no one helped them.

    Normal mothers/fathers would never do such things.

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  11. I can understand, or at least empathize with most dysfunctional behavior but I just cannot stretch my brain here. I think that some crimes are so severe and heinous in the aftermath that a person's own history becomes irrelevant.

    There was another local case recently where the news kept saying, blah blah blah "had sex with a 3 year old". There is NO SUCH THING as sex with a 3 year old! There is assault, there is rape but there is no "sex with".

    Ugh.

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  12. Ok I have to put my two cents in as a person who has worked with abused children for many years. Why the hell was her bail set at $1,000? Didn't anyone else notice that? $1,000? After what she did? I'm sick of the double standard when it involves children. You shoot a cop and leave him paralyzed you get life. You shake a baby, leave them paralyzed and blind you may get a year or so.I know of one woman who left her baby blind and in a vegetative state. She served one year and upon her release her probation involved not being around children for 10 years. What a joke. Her second pregnancy was discovered by someone who saw her walking down the street and hounded the authorities until they actually removed the child after birth. In the mean time (This is a period of 6 years) she gets pregnant a 3rd time and some ninny has given her a "case plan" which she completed and she was getting to keep her baby and get the now 3 year old from relatives where he has been since birth removal!! Someone saw her ramblings on Facebook (thank GOD!)and reported her. CPS had "no knowledge" of the 6 year old she had shaken half to death. What? The 6 year old was in foster care..."no knowledge?" I had a 3 week old baby who had 17 broken bones and had been tortured by the parents pushing their thumbs into her eye sockets.There were never any charges because neither parent "admitted" to it. If this baby was a policeman,politician or prominent member of society who had been beaten and tortured do you really think nothing would have been pursued? Is this unusual? In my state it happens all the time.I gave my foster license up after 14 years of this double standard crap. I don't have the heart anymore to see this on a daily basis.$1,000? There should have been NO bail.

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