is DH touching dd inappropriately?

[stirling]

Hello,
this is difficult to post but i really need some opinions.
Will try to start from the beginning. When DD was born (now 3)my husband would always smile/laugh at her genitals and feel amazed that we have a girl. (already have a son aged 5). Ive seen him and his mother 'affectionately' pinching her nipples since she was a tiny baby and laughing.
DD is now 3 and Ive noticed that whenever DD needs clothes changed either for bedtime or morning, DH quickly whisks her upstairs(before I get to stand up) and then I hear her squealing and laughing 'no stop it!' (she is not distressed in anyway).

He also always wants to take her to wee (she is fully potty trained but needs help with clothes/wiping) and on a few occasions she has been wet and he's needed to change her. When Ive confronted him and asked him how she got wet, he says she lifts her bottom up to show how she wees..Im shocked because she has NEVER done this with me, nor do I think she could come up with the idea of showing how she wees.

He is always squeezing her bum -not such a crime but its very often.
My gut feeling is that he is fascinated by her and finds her very cute, my concern is him touching her when changing her clothes.

I confronted him today in totally the wrong way. I said that I know he finds her cute but that he should maybe not touch her genitals now that she is no longer a baby. He exploded with rage. He said he only tickles her (when undressed) and then he flicked me on my forehead and stormed off :(

I realise I took a huge risk and have probably jeapordised my marriage but at the same time if he is stroking/tickling/kissing her down below I feel it should stop.
Ive tried walking in on them to catch him but her pjs are usually slipped on by then.

Sorry this is long. Im taking her to get dressed/loo as much as I can but have been ill a lot lately and bed bound.
Any advice appreciated. Thankyou

K12, Stirling did not accuse him of abusing her, that was exactly my point. It seems she took pains not to do that but just to say she felt it shouldn't continue as she was growing older. Being angry at this doesn't justify head flicking. Just stop and imagine someone doing that to you in anger. How do you feel?

As to nipple pinching being 'normal' for her husband - again, yes his intent may not be abusive and he may well not be getting a sexual charge from it, but the consensus seems to be that it's not an appropriate touch and therefore it shouldn't continue through the generations. If he has that pointed out to him and continues to do it then isn't he being abusive?

x-post with Kerry

I am going to have to take a deep breath to go back and read the whole thread when I can face it.

Like others on here I was abused pretty much from birth as best I can glean.

No one in a very crowded house ever witnessed anything other than normal affection from my abuser. In fact he was careful to be a bit distant with me but would occasionally grab my bum or do 'normal' range gestures of affection.
In spite of my background I rarely get a sense of anything untoward in the behaviour of adults around children but when I do it is not what they are doing but the way they ate doing it iyswim.

This is a flat medium and it is impossible to describe verbally the difference between an act that seems innocent and one that worries me. Therein lies the difficulty.
A mum or dad can kiss their Childs bum and it will be totally innocent. My abuser was able to rub my sot Mach in a way that felt like a violation because actually it was. It was everything to do with his intent and that is impossible to measure from thecoutside.
At three the child will not betray any fear or discomfort because whatever is happening ,to her it isnormal and a happy simplecpart if her relationship with that adult.

So a fucking nightmare situation really.

But I would struggle with anyone who dismisses a loving mother who has been sufficiently unnerved to reach fir abuse as an explanation.
Barring a history od abuse, a significant reason not to trust her husband or mental illness, most rational people would not assume or fear abuse unless there is something that prompts it.

My abuse carried on until I was old enough to stop it. No one ever witnessed anything. People on here advising my mother would have ensured that my abuse continued by insisting that with no evidence she should just get a grip. I don't blame them for that advice, I understand it. But I do wish a couple of family members had followed their instinct that something was not quite right. I really do.

Quite simply if the OP could even think that that something untoward is occuring it sets Alarm Bells ringing as many on this thread have said.

Many of us have catagorically stated that we would never imagine our DH doing anything like, it would not cross our minds to suspect.

Yes, concrete evidence would confirm it ( although I could cry at what that concrete evidence would be) but the very fact that she suspects it is concern enough.

But she has never actually seen her husband touching the dd's genitals! She just worries that he might, and she said to him that he shouldnt - which, if hebis innocent, would of course horrify him!

Pagwatch, of course it's terrible that you had to live through this. But it's one thing to hope that real life people will be on hand to rescue the situation one way or another, quite another to jump to conclusions on an Internet forum on the basis of no evidence whatsoever!

I was not aware that I had jumped to any conclusions.

I'm a bit worried by the number of posts that have stressed how significant the OP's suspicion is and then smugly said that they could never imagine their DH doing anything remotely inappropriate.

How arrogant is that? I have no reason at all to suspect my DH of anything inapprpriate but I totally could imagine that he is capable of such a thing. As a mother I have to imagine there are risks out there and I have to imagine that those risks could come from somewhere supposedly safe.

DH and I spoke about this thread. He wasn't offended that I did consider it possible that these things could happen within our family.

Sorry pagwatch that came out wrong, I didn't mean that you had jumped to conclusions.

Stirling - have you and DH spoken since yesterday's discussion and forehead flicking? I'm hoping that he will have seen how stupid his response was and that you can have a mature discussion.

I am totally torn on this one. On one hand some of it seems fairly innocous. However, if I was worried that there was even a tiny chance of this happening there is no way whatsoever I'd be plannting cameras for proof. If I had any worries I would be making sure there is no way anything could happen iyswim?

I think without knowing the op or her H or even the context it is difficult to say.

A lot of people have been outraged re the forehead flicking. I think if I was accused of something that I hadn't done I would be so angry I probably would do similar.

Oh and wrt nipple pinching, I've never pinched any of my baby's nipples. We do tickling, raspberry blowing and I pretend to bite my childrens bums and newborn babys are just kissable, especially necks and that bit on the forehead bewteen the forehead and nose. I can absolutely 100% say I do this with no sexual gratification on my part whatsoever.

I can also say sadly I have been subjected to abuse, not by a parent but a close family friend.

Hi Stirling

I am not going to argue or agree/disagree with some of the posts on here as I feel it's becoming a slanging match and I don't think that's what you need.

So, I've read through all 10 pages ( mad I know) and skipped through a lot of the heated stuff and posted to ask........(as nobody else is)

how are you doing today? Any further developments happening? Did you take the advice from the man you spoke to on the phone? How has your DH been since you commented on his behaviour?

That's all :-)

S'alright emkana. I think I need to read the thread. I am taking your comments out of context.

A statistic from the NSPCC comments that 1% of children have been sexually abused.

DH does care cases and he is positive that sexual abuse is far less widespread than childcare professionals think, but more widespread than the general public think.

That 1% statistic must be suspect (there's nothing like 1% of cases that are reported) but let's go with it for a minute. Say there are 800,000 Mumsnet members, with say an average of 2 children. That's 1.6m Mumsnet children. On that basis 16,000 of them are probably the victims of sexual abuse.

So it's not impossible at all.

But on the other hand, the Mental Health Foundation comments that 1 in 4 adults experience at least one diagnosable mental health problem.

Which probably makes it 25 times more likely that the OP is being a bit nuts than it is that her husband is guilty of sexual abuse.

My point is that none of us can say anything other than consult the relevant organisations, or try to get to the bottom of this uncomfortable feeling.

how do you define 'nuts'??

I'm not really grasping how it helps anyone to propose the possibility of the OP being nuts here.

Accusing the OP of being mad. Nice one Quattro. Very helpful.

She didn't accuse her husband of abusing their child. She suggested certain activities of his with her were no longer appropriate as she is getting older. And he exploded with rage and made a physical gesture which was insulting, demeaning and threatening. That is what actually happened.

Oh don't worry about it, I probably was a bit mean to that poster on that thread. I frequently am. I can also be quite supportive on occasion. A bit like MN in general.

Nuts quattro?

What a very helpful suggestion ...

"The true prevalence of sexual violence against children is difficult to estimate since it is a secret crime. However, a recent review published in The Lancet estimated that between 5?10 per cent of girls and 5 per cent of boys have experienced penetrative sexual abuse and up to three times this number have been exposed to other forms of sexual violence (Gilbert et al, 2008)."

I thought I would post this as it is from the NSPCC.

I didn't want Quattro's latest post to go unchallenged.

OP don't you listen to any posters who have come on here and accused you of being mad.

Get the help you need.