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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

To think my DD needs help.

73 replies

MummyEire · 11/12/2016 15:03

I don't want to drip feed but I also don't want to reveal DD's identity either.

Dd has been through a lot,her dad dying,bullied and had to move secondary school 3 times ,living with a relative for a year,she told us she had been sexually abused from the age of 4 she thinks(15 now).

Since she was about 8 she has struggled with her eating but she is not underweight now . She skips breakfast and lunch and when she does eat she usually has a vegetable smoothie and that is it for the day.

She's been self harming since around 10 years old,she says she has nightmares and gets flash backs of the abuse where she can hear his voice,smell him etc . She can't stand loud noises,being too close to people,she can't even sleep in her own room as she's scared that he will come. The person has admitted to sending her dirty messages to the police but the case did not go any further as dd didn't want to talk about what he did.

Camhs have said they cannot help her as it is not 'severe enough',I've tried private therapy but she refuses to talk in these sessions.

She is very withdrawn all the time,never looks happy but GP and camhs are saying she is just being a typical teenage girl .

OP posts:
Allthewaves · 11/12/2016 21:12

My first step would be to cut contact with family tbh. If I was abused and my family didnt believe me but my mum was still in contact with them I would really doubt she actually believed me and was just telling me what I wanted to hear

joystir59 · 11/12/2016 21:17

please stand up to your family for her and ensure that they either agree to exclude the abuser from any event that your daughter will attend or you will have nothing to do with them. Please be her rock and her lioness. I was sexually abused by a family member and my mum did not stand up for me- I was blamed for the abuse and it honestly haunted me and affected me all my life. the more you can be there for her the better. I am so grateful that you believe her, thank goodness you do- it will help her so much. I cannot emphasise enough just how profound the affect of sexual abuse is- the person that did this to her has permanently damaged her. Hopefully she will with help and time grow beyond this damage and heal- but she will never be as she was before the abuse.

baconandeggies · 11/12/2016 21:33

Yes - cut contact from any family who remain in any way involved with this man.

iwasbornaunicorn · 11/12/2016 21:45

I'm sorry if I'm wrong about my perception of you but it sounds like you've been doing lots to get her help but been passive about getting her justice.

For someone I'm very close to she has never forgiven her mum for not fighting for her although she was a bit older she still needed a trusted adult to help her fight she felt like her mum was hiding it because she was ashamed of her.

How did you react on seeing her abuser?

Personally I have never forgiven my parents for being polite to a man who when I was 12 touched me & said lewd things again they seemed ashamed of me or they didn't believe me.

Maybe she needs you to get angry for her??

bodiddly · 11/12/2016 21:54

Hi, I can't seem to get a PM to come up on my phone. Do you want to send me one or I can try again from my PC in the morning?

RedHelenB · 11/12/2016 21:55

If she says she wants to go to the police again please support her. Surely if it happened as recently as last year they could make a case but you will need to support her in being brave enough to open up.

Absolutely agree with not going to family events if there is even the slightest possibility he could be there.

MummyEire · 11/12/2016 22:00

You have all been so kind and helpful-thank you.
I'm just getting round to sending/answering PM's.

From now on DD will not be seen at any family event.

I'm not sure how I reacted when I saw him. both times we have got there before he arrived and been fine,no one mentioned that he is coming and when he did I went straight to another family member to say how upset I was,by this point he was walking over to dd,trying to talk to her and her cousin . She was shaking in tears,she was hysterical,we left.

After that they did it again. As soon as we saw him we were out .

OP posts:
titchy · 11/12/2016 22:13

I think you should refuse to attend as well.

MummyEire · 11/12/2016 22:18

I won't be attending either. I don't want him to think I am welcoming him or dd to think that .

OP posts:
bumsexatthebingo · 11/12/2016 22:21

Are you going to maintain contact with the family members who have accused your dd of making it up? Do they know about the messages and are ok with it?

iwasbornaunicorn · 11/12/2016 22:22

I don't want you to feel like I'm attacking you but why didn't you see red when he came near your daughter?

I try not to generalise regarding how people should behave but most parents would be more angry.

Personally I don't think he'd have survived being in the same room as me if it was my daughter.

I wonder if this because you have your own demons to deal with? Your child going through this may have subconsciously triggered you to withdraw to protect you from pain.

Please don't exclude your daughter from family events she's not done anything, he gets to never step a foot near her again otherwise you literally hand him his balls. I'd go to the police & at least get a restraining order I'm sure the messaging would be enough.

My thoughts are with you both.

Rixera · 11/12/2016 22:36

Police, going no contact with family etc are all things to be done in her own time.

I wouldn't like to criticise your reaction at the time, they are your family too! It's tough. But good on you for saying you were upset and, vitally, taking your daughter away. Being free to leave in that situation aids in feeling the escape, which reduces the risk of long term PTSD- it's a psychological thing to do with fight or flight, she had a successful flight.

But it's important she is kept safe away from him as I'm sure you understand. And that she feels you are totally in her corner.

MummyEire · 11/12/2016 22:39

Family members have seen proof of messages.

This man is so much more physically stronger than me. If I had the strentgh,believe me he would not see the daylight again. I honestly thought if she sits with cousin for a minute whilst I talk to another family member,he wouldn't go near her .

I will speak to the police about what I can do as I'm sure her seeing him will count as a safeguarding issue.

OP posts:
malificent7 · 11/12/2016 22:42

Emdr is amazing... changed my life. Helped with ptsd due to abuse. Available on nhs. Go to gp and adk for it.
Im a different person after it.

ThatsWotSheSaid · 11/12/2016 22:50

This might sound harsh but you should have let your DD be in that situation at the party. The second you saw him and you should have left and ideally you should have anticipated it, especially the second party, and not gone. If I was you I would cut contact with all the people.

anotherdayanothersquabble · 11/12/2016 23:10

Reiki can be done at a distance. Or on the same room. No touching required.

Wishing you and your daughter the best. xxx

anotherdayanothersquabble · 11/12/2016 23:28

Malificent, great to hear good things about edmr, somatic experiencing is similar which does not require the person to relive the trauma to start recovering.

FeralBeryl · 12/12/2016 00:04

Your poor lovely girl Sad
You have been given done great practical advice from the wiser ones, I just wanted to add my support and to categorically agree that you must, must refrain from interacting with any family members that know about the messages and refuse to condone them.
DD needs to know that you have got her, and only her back no matter who else is in the picture. She needs that security.
I wish you both well Flowers

homeworksavioursneeded · 12/12/2016 00:13

I couldn't engage with my cancer counsellors as sitting in a tiny room and having to make eye contact just didn't work for me. I would have been able to speak if we had been out walking somewhere and I could have looked straight ahead. DS is at his most open when we are on a long journey and he can chat knowing no eye contact is required. I don't know if you can try varying how to chat to her until you find a way she is more comfortable with.

HoopsandEverything · 12/12/2016 08:16

MummyEire

Only go to the police if you want to report this - not for advice. They will have to follow this up, please seek advocacy from Rape Crisis first regarding the process and what will happen once you have spoken to the police.

Please also research options for counselling / therapy that have measured outcomes and have been proven to work successfully in cases of childhood sexual abuse - these are namely EMDR, Psychoanalytic Psychotherapy and person centred counselling which have the best outcomes.

MsMoppet · 12/12/2016 09:06

I had EMDR 15yrs ago and it saved my life. It helped me, and my therapist to work out what was hurting me. I had been too young to remember and had blocked out much of my childhood memories. So as to not give the wrong impression I should point out that the emotional abuse I suffered was not that bad looking back as an adult - but to my childhood self it had done a lot of damage. And as I had blocked the memories I didn't know what had damaged me so much.

Indrid · 12/12/2016 10:00

Camhs will have their hands tied to an extent, if she doesn't engage with out patients but isn't at 'severe' enough risk to warrent being sectioned.

It might be useful for you to clarify with camhs when they can step in of necessary, and for future if she does choose to engage what option there are. Ofcourse it would be great if they could keep trying with her in the meantime but camhs are desperately over stretched.

It would be a good idea to find some support yourself, counciling, support group, education on sexual abuse and self harm. It's really important to learn to be comfortable talking about it, or listening to it, which isn't easy or natural for a parent.

Can you access a more supportive gp? You could ask the recepitionists to recommend which gp has experience of supporting families with children who have been abused and children with mh problems.

Can you look into charities that help? Women's aid/rape crisis/Barnardos/nspcc etc? Even if that's just support for you to then help her. And local self harm support service?

Cutting contact with any and all family who support him, or don't fully support her is essential. Back her 100%.

Look into other resources- there are numerous Internet forums for survivors of abuse, not all will be suit able for your daughter but some will. Often it can be easier to first talk about these things online, and to other survivors. There are books- one called something along the lines of how to heal from sexual abuse iirc. There will be survivors own works, from poetry to stories to songs. Try find famous people she admires who are open about their abuse, knowing other people talk about it helps. Also, and this will depend on her triggers so may not be suitable, but many of us survivors are drawn to films/tv/books that deal with abuse. They 'normalise' our experience so that we understand it isn't just us, we are not completely different or strange or alone, tha and the show better outcomes (special victims unit is a great one for this, as well as giving us the helpful language to use to begin talking about it in rl). But this does depend on everyone's individual triggers, some will equally need to avoid these.

General feel good activities, coffee out, time with friends, therapeutic sport like horse riding or other time caring for animals helps for some. Healthy self care, gym/hair dresser.

What about approaching social care services? Maybe they could find a support worker or you could self refer for a befriender?

It isn't uncommon to take alot of time to get to the stage where counciling is possible. Many of us need to wait until we are 'safe' enough to be able to talk to someone about the abuse. While controlling food and s/h are scarey for you they can often be the crutch that stop us doing worse things and keep us safe until we can cope with facing it in therapy. And while self blame is a very tough and destructive emotion in the long term, it the short term it serves some purpose and gives us the illusion of control because letting go of the idea it wasn't our fault also means facing the reality that we couldn't do anything to stop it, and therefore can not do anything to stop anyone else, everyone doing the same thing. Which is only possible to face that kind of uncertainty when we have alot of emotional safety and strategies to help/people who help.

Finally about feeling safe, in the literal sense, is there anything you can do to help with that? Better locks on the door/security camera/rape whisle? Dog that would comfort and help protect her? Female only self defense class? And do tell her dv or rape is often why women attend. Can police or social service do anything to reassure her about safety?

Good luck. Best thing you can do is support her and believe everything she tells you about this.

MummyEire · 13/12/2016 17:04

Thank you so much everyone . Dd has been struggling this week and hasn't managed to go to school yesterday or today . She's very attached to me at the moment and doesn't even want me to go to work.

We had got chocolate ,films and time to talk and she's considering counselling now .

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