Why the abused becomes the abuser

It’s a survival mechanism, the abused becoming the abuser—simple, crude, an adaptive distortion. Our ability to adapt in order to survive is embedded deep within every one of us. It works very effectively in most of us, and less well in those with physical or mental scarring. Yet, even when compromised the will and impulses to survive are so strong that they will keep on keeping on, even in perverting forms. And this is not the ‘ooo-er, naughty’ misuse of perversion. It means perversions as a distortion, a twisting, a corruption.

It is arguably persuasive that the cycle of the sexually abused becoming the abuser is this kind of perversion of our survival mechanism. If this is the case then it is equally arguable that this distortion can be reset.

Neuroscience argues for this, particularly in the field of neuroplasticity—the potential of the brain to reorganize itself throughout our life. The most relevant aspect of this, in relation to child sexual abuse, is the possibility of being able to work with abused children, particularly around puberty, and post-puberty, to help them to shift thinking and habit patterns that developed as a result of sexual abuse, patterns such as extreme promiscuity, or early signs of becoming an abuser.

In practice

Let me try and explain.

A girl, a little girl, let’s call her Lucy, was serially abused from the age of three by a member of her family, an uncle who had lost his job and had come to stay with the family. For several years the abuse was apparently unnoticed by other members of the family. By the time Lucy was seven she was presenting a whole range of behaviour problems at school, but because of a series of misunderstandings, her aggression with other children, her clinginess with her mother, and sleep problems, were put down to other reasons, particularly her parent’s deteriorating marriage.

Lucy’s parents separated, quite amicably, and her father began to have her, her sister and brother, to stay at the week-ends. As he was on sole-parent duty during these stays, and because he often let his children stay up quite late watching television, while he sat with them while he worked, he tried to be diligent in watching over them. He noticed that Lucy was behaving sexually very overtly with her brother. He was two years older than her, nine to her seven. Lucy would curl up next to him, usually after fighting with her older sister, and then, quite openly, she would start to rub her brother’s groin and grab at his penis repeatedly.

Lucy’s father watched in horror, but he had no idea what to do. So, he took in what he had seen and he went to talk to a child behaviour specialist.

The point of this is not to judge whether Lucy was becoming an under-age sexual predator. The point is our point of view, our response.

Lucy was behaving very alarmingly with her brother. A common reaction would have been shock, and then to shout at or scold the child in this state of shock. Lucy would not have understood, except for beginning to experience shame without realising why. She had been groomed by an uncle to behave this way with men. She was doing what she understood as being how she was supposed to behave with males. She had been prepped to do this, perhaps rewarded, cajoled, sworn into a pact of special secrecy by the abuser.

Lucy adapted to survive, her mind normalising what was happening to her by taking it on as a learnt way of interacting with the opposite sex.

Her uncle was arrested.

Recovery

Lucy has been reconstructing the sense of who she is, with a combination of therapeutic work, normalcy, and steady support. Now, at fourteen, she seems to be doing well, with a teenage girl’s tentative though naturally growing confidence. Her performance at school is average to good, she has friends, and she has a boyfriend who she has not had sex with, she reports. Without these supports systems it is likely that she would have become sexually predatory, and by this I mean overt, maybe using sex as a way of getting things that she needed, not necessarily in the form of prostitution, though this is common too, but perhaps using her body in a harsh, functional way, as a trade. Or, she could have frozen emotionally, becoming perhaps agoraphobic, unable to function in public places without having panic attacks, or by being terrified of any more secluded scenario that reminded her of the places where her uncle abused her. Sleep problems could have become aggravated to the point where she could not function properly. Underage drug use is also a common reaction, as is alcoholism and all other methods or ‘getting out of it’—anything to numb the feelings of shame, or the drilling anxiety that comes of sexual abuse.

Her uncle is serving a prison sentence. Lucy turned out to have been one in a long history of grooming and abuse.

During the trial, a psychologist reported that, based on interviews with the defendant, it seemed that he had been serially abused as a child, and that he became an abuser when he was still under the consensual age for sex.

The questions that cannot be answered accurately

The questions are these: would Lucy have had the potential to become an abuser if her father had not realised that something was very wrong? No, highly unlikely as 97% of child sex abusers are male. But she stood a very high chance of getting drawn into a child sexual abuse ring, of becoming an addict and so being drawn into drug-muling, prostitution, sex-trafficking, the menu is endless in its capacity to destroy. She has a very good chance now of avoiding these. She is vulnerable, but she is not unprotected.

And the other question: what difference could it have made to the uncle if someone had noticed in him what Lucy’s father noticed in her? I am leery on hypothetical scenarios because of their tendency to be taken as being factual. The truth is that I do not know how different the outcome would have been. Would Lucy have become so promiscuous that she lost herself if she had not started on a therapeutic process? Would her uncle have been able to find himself if he, in turn, had been given access to the same kind of support and therapy that Lucy has had, and continues to have?

It is impossible to answer either of those questions with any accuracy, but what is clear is that Lucy has a very good chance, and she seems well on her way to reclaiming herself beyond the damage of sexual abuse. Her uncle does not have this chance.

There is too much evidence in the favour of early intervention. Those who argue against it, and there are those that do, simply do not know what they are talking about.

Part III to come, looking more closely at recovery from sexual abuse…