What Can I Do?

What Can I Do?

 By: Pamela Joy Smith

 As an experienced prosecutor, I am often asked “what can I do?” There are so many things that you can do but my primary response is to become educated about child abuse and become involved.  As concerned parents, we need to begin the discussion about child abuse in our own homes with our children.  Unfortunately for those children who are being abused at the hands of their parents or caregivers, the abused children are living the nightmare.  It is incumbent upon our teachers to educate our children about the various kinds of child abuse as well as what children should do if they are being abused. Our teachers should encourage their students to continue the discussion at home.

Since our children spend the majority of their days in school, it is not unusual for an abused child to confide in their teacher.  It then becomes the teacher’s responsibility to protect that child by reporting the abuse to the authorities.  In fact the majority of jurisdictions make it mandatory that teachers and health care providers must report abuse. Sometimes adults question their involvement in such sensitive and horrendous matters. Currently I have a voice teacher who recently told me that one of his young students had confided in him that she was being raped by the stepfather.  Everytime she tells her mother about the abuse, the mother beats her.  I was so discouraged when I asked him if he had called the authorities to report the abuse.  He responded with the typical answer that I hear too frequently, “I don’t want to get involved and what if she is lying about this? “ I strongly encouraged him to make the call and help this child.  When he answered that he wanted to think about it, I asked whether he would identify the child to me and I would make the call. I tried to reason with him and tell him that children of abuse are so traumatized that they are often afraid to report the abuse to anyone for fear of retaliation.  It takes a lot of courage for a child to confide in an adult It is not our job to try to determine if the child is being straight forward, rather report it and let the experts determine the validity as well as the extent of the abuse.  In fact many cases are undetected because the abused child refuses to tell anyone about the abuse.

If a child places their trust in you with what they are experiencing please do not ignore the child, your call could save that child’s life and also protect that child from repeated incidents of child abuse.  In many jurisdictions, you can remain anonymous. Get educated on this topic and get involved. Join us at Whatafan.com in our commitment to black out child abuse.