I have not been posting, as I just don't have anything to add. But I still follow and pray for Dylan and everyone who loves him and holds him dear.
There is one thing I just feel like commenting on. I often hear people say for a person to be held captive or to be a victim of sex trafficking is a fate worse than death. I know what people mean, and I know it comes from a place of deep compassion and horror at what that experience must be like. But I also think about so many victims around the world of intense, horrific circumstances who have SURVIVED. I volunteered in Bosnia during the war where women and girls were held captive and raped repeatedly. I think of people who survived the Holocaust and other genocides. There is something so courageous and indefatigable about the human spirit and the will to survive.
I guess I also worry sometimes or feel uncomfortable about the idea that a person may be better off dead than to have experienced trauma, even atrocity and survived. I know people don't mean that at all but I wonder if it plays into survivors feelings of being permanently damaged--especially in sex abuse cases where children may feel like they are permanently tainted for the rest of their lives. This was a big deal in Bosnia where because of cultural issues many women and girls were considered "dishonored" or "ruined" . That's not so much an issue here in the U.S., but I wonder if we subconsciously kind of think in a similar way. I had a pediatrician who went on to be a forensic doc in child sex abuse cases. She said one of the things she did was try to empower children by saying "you are going to be OK. You are going to heal." She didn't mean it in a cliched, cavalier way--she meant it as hope.
I'm not meaning to be disparaging or criticize anyone for their point of view. I just wanted to throw it out there as another perspective. I've just seen it a lot and wanted to express what I was thinking. I hope I don't make anyone feel bad, as again, I do understand what people mean. JMO
BBM
I know this post is from over a week ago, however I needed to say "Thank you". I agree with all you have said above. Thanks for your work in helping those women and girls in Bosnia as well - it's horrifying what those people went through.
There are still so many out there in our society that blame the victim in so many ways when bad things like this happened. I think it's mostly fear on the part of those who say such things like; "she should've known better than to drink", or "she should've been wearing something else", etc... I don't think they can accept the fact that there really are people in our world who set out to harm others. Knowing that the victims really didn't do anything wrong would make the person acknowledge that bad things happen to good people - and can even happen to you, or someone else you love.
Hope - such a powerful strong emotion for any survivor. I will also add that as a survivor, and as the mother of two survivors reassuring the child that everything WILL be OK, and their life doesn't have to revolve around what happened is the MOST important thing to get through to these children. There is already so much shame associated with so much of it that having older people reassure you that there is nothing "wrong" with you - despite what you may have gone through really, really helps.
One more quick thing to share - I actually had to drop out of psych 101 in college due to not being able to deal with what the book had to say about victims of childhood abuse (particularly sexual abuse). The things taught in some of the psych classes paint a very negative picture of all victims - talking about the worst of the worst cases, particularly those who never recover, or go on to abuse others. At my age at the time 19 - I wasn't ready to deal with some of it, and just ended up dropping the class instead. I wonder how many "silent" victims come across this type of information - whether in a class, or hearing it in the media, etc... and decide at that point to /never/ get help (if they need it), or /never/ admit anything happened due to assumptions that everyone will think that /you/ will turn into your abuser.
So, I guess in summary, I do think that here in the US still have the same problems in regard to seeing victims as "forever changed", "ruined", "will always be less than"... etc... It's not so much out in the open anymore - those sentiments of others, and I think that's due to the fact that assault and abuse issues are talked about more publicly now, and there has been a lot done to address the issue of victim shaming especially. However, what people say, and what they think to themselves are sometimes two different things.
Anyway, thanks again for your post - sorry this is such a late-coming reply, and O/T.
