Protecting the Gift

by Gavin De Becker. I have heard a lot about this book from other mothers who had read it and highly recommended it. When I started reading it I realised I had seen him on Oprah before discussing his last book "The gift of fear".
the book is primarily targeted toward mothers and how to protect our children. He has stories in there of women who fought off attackers and all of the things that ran through their head before, during and after the incident. What he did make me feel was confident that I could beat the crap out of anyone who tried to hurt me or my children with my children present. Especially with my children present.
At the beginning of the book he discusses intiution. that "gut" feeling that we all get from some people we meet on the street. the feeling that tells us they may be dangerous people. and how often we disregard and rationalize away that feeling because its not polite. take getting on an elevator for instance, say the doors open and you see a person whom immediately you do not get a good feeling from, your first instinct is to not get on the elevator. but what do you do? you rationalize away these thoughts, tell yourself it would not be polite and get on a steel framed box with a potentially very dangerous person. Dogs at least follow their intitution. you know those dogs that freak out when they know a person is bad? It makes me appreciate Bentley's mostly misplaced passion about delivery men. but I do realise now that its very likely that Bentley *would* act on my behalf if a situation arouse where I needed it.

He gets into very practical matters on protecting our children. like protecting them from sexual predators. He has a whole chapter on it. and talking to people I realise there is still such an epidemic of silence within families and churches.
Take for instance my story. My story who is so many others stories. There was a pedophile within our denomination as a child who called himself a minister to children and a missionary. He had a mobile home he drove around north America, literally. When I was 9 he came to my parents house to see them, he had been a long time family friend to both of my grandparents. He asked if me and my brother could stay with him in his mobile home, my parents, though they did have niggling doubt, conceded and with great excitement I stayed with him in his camper. The rest I am sure you can fill in with your imagination. it was not *that bad*, though definitely traumatic for me, enough that I blocked it out for about 3 years.

The reason I tell this story is because surrouding him there was an epidemic of silence. there were rumours, stories, "maybes" about who he was as a person, but you know children, they make stuff up. and you know, he is a minister.
My own mother disregarded her intiution because she rationalised away her gut feeling. And no, I have absolutely zero anger toward my parents for this. I don't consider that their fault, because even though it happened AFTER the fact they acknowledged my trauma and supported me through the fallout. A lot of families do not do this. They tell the child the feelings they have are not important and irrelevant, and if you would just ignore the problem it would go away. Well it doesn't/didn't and my parents helped me through it. I know it was extremely difficult for both of them, but how do you think I know that my mother had heard rumours? or that she had a gut feeling she rationalised? because we talked about, which is more than happens to a lot of victims.

But this epidemic of silence from those who knew had far reaching consequences. This man was in his 70's. he had travelled for years. He was finally caught when I was 13. they say that before a pedophile is caught, he will have likely molested between 30-60 children. I am willing to bet his number was astronomically higher. and this was because he had a position of trust and NO ONE TOLD. Until he finally RAPED a 9 year old girl and she WAS NOT silent.

We have an obligation to protect our children. As I read this book, filled with other tales of abuse to children, trying to fathom how ANYONE could hurt a child, I was also filled with the thought "not on my watch". not on my watch will either of my daughters be subjected to physical or sexual abuse. I will follow my gut, my intiution and I will be a very proactive parent. Between the ages of 13-18 is when my daughters are most at risk for being raped. I am goign to teach them that NO is a full sentence. That they do not have to be polite to someone just because he is a man (which is what women are taught) This will always be in my mind, whether at the forefront or not, when raising these precious human beings. I will listen to my intiution when something does not feel right. I know that I cannot control human behaviour, but God gave us these signals for a reason. I am going to do everything within my power to protect my children from the dangers that I know.
and if God forbid, something should happen, I will not deny or pretend what happened to them did not happen. I will acknowledge it and pursue whatever means I need to to get justice for my daughter. Be afraid, be very afraid of me if you hurt my children. (no, I won't hunt you down and kill you, not the hunting part anyway)
The book also has other stories about severely abused children. There was even a story of a 6 week old being tortured by her father. a 2 year old by its mother. it was sickening to read for me. I don't know if its just that I have a real soft heart, but the thought of it makes me physically ill. maybe its because I had a 6 week old laying next to me sleeping soundly, trusting her mother would not hurt her or even think of it. and I couldn't. The father of the 6 week old went onto confess that he had also killed his stepson who had been misdiagnosed as having SIDS. its unbelievable to me what society does to the smallest members. and how we can sit by and do nothing. so yes, I am on the side of the fence that says that goverment interference is more than welcome. families are not so sacred that they should be kept together at all costs. children are most likely to be abused before the age of 5. that would be me hurting my daughter deliberately. this I cannot imagine.

One of the reasons I don't spank is because of myself. I don't spank because I know how angry that I can get. If I start hitting my child out of frustration, I could hit her a lot harder then I should and if I am really angry, hit her for too long. This decision to not spank is for her own protection and mine. According to prospanking books, you are only suppose to hit your child when you are calm. That is the biggest crock I have ever heard. when I have any inkling to hit my daughter its when I am most frustrated with some behaviour she keeps doing over and over. Unless I became a regular hitter/spanker, I cannot imagine getting to that point. though I know its possible as other parents have attested.

Anyway. these are my thoughts. if you have children in your life, even if you are not a parent, its a very good book. I am very pleased that I read it.