Self-empowerment

It would seem that year upon year more stories emerge about child sexual abuse within the church and its ongoing attempts to cover up crimes. I recently came across a film made in 1990 called Judgment, which is based on a true story about a young boy who was sexually abused by his local priest. I’m sure that when the film came out in the 90s it was ground breaking in contrast to current headlines which often include this familiar theme.

A couple of things have spurred me on to write this post, perhaps the most significant one was the very moving scene at the end of the film where the young boy trashed his bedroom as a way of releasing the inner rage he was clearly experiencing. It’s a scene that I could relate to in many ways, and seeing it re-enacted so convincingly had quite an impact.

Survivors can be triggered at any given moment and that’s also something I wanted to expand on. In another scene in the film, the boy’s father was about to beat the boy and yelled, “Take your pants down.” I can only imagine the huge psychological impact that would have had on the boy, as he was probably re-experiencing a similar moment he’d endured with the priest.

When you’ve experienced abuse, you have to learn to cope with triggers, especially when they hit you out of nowhere. We can do our best to avoid them or we can always be ready for them, but people around us could also try to be sensitive to our emotional needs. Sadly, some people lack knowledge and understanding when it comes to being around abuse survivors and it’s a topic that comes up in my writing frequently based on personal and external accounts. Over the years I’ve learnt that I can change, but if others refuse to do so, I don’t have to force myself to be in their company. I guess you could call this self-empowerment, something that can take a long time for abuse survivors to achieve, but once you get there, you don’t look back.