For a child or teenager, processing a traumatic experience like sexual or physical abuse can be difficult and have lasting effects that change the course of their life.
While prevention remains an important part of sexual assault education, much of the real work comes after an assault occurs.
The Monongalia County Child Advocacy Center (CAC) works with children who have been abused or neglected by providing a friendly and safe environment where children and their families can be interviewed, supported and healed.
“I can’t stress enough how much children are hurting right now … ,” Dr. Laura Capage, founding director of the CAC said. “The majority of teenagers have contemplated suicide or have serious depression, kids are really struggling. It’s so important we get them these supports, or we know what’s going to happen when they become adults and they are going to struggle more.”
Capage said victims tend to have immediate and long-term reactions to their trauma. More immediately you could see kids withdraw or get very anxious or clingy. They might seem sadder than usual or even begin acting out with aggression and fighting.
“It could go either way,” she said, “but regardless there is usually some type of emotional component to this. You’re going to see a change in their behavior and their emotional state.”
Most concerning, Capage said, are the long-term effects, because kids who have been traumatized in some way are much more likely to have a multitude of problems.
According to Capage, child trauma victims are more likely to have behavioral problems, be involved with the criminal justice system, suffer emotional problems and mental health disorders, and develop substance abuse disorders. They are also more at risk to not graduate high school, have a teenage pregnancy, or even suffer physical health problems like diabetes, heart problems and obesity.
The Dominion Post recently spoke with a local mother about her teenage son’s path to recovery after he was the victim of a sexual assault a few years ago. To protect her son’s identity, she asked not to be identified so for the purposes of this article we will call her Beth.
In high school Beth’s son, now a young adult, was raped by another teenager, a friend. The news came as a shock to the single mother of two boys.
“Having a son, I naively didn’t really think about sexual assault. That was something I thought parents with daughters worried about,” she said. “And I thought it would be from a stranger. I didn’t know it would be from someone that he called his friend.”
Seeing her son so devastated, Beth didn’t know what the future was going to hold and how much this was going to affect the teen. “There was no real guidebook,” she said.
After the assault, Beth said her priority became keeping her son alive after two hospitalizations for suicidal ideations and a third time after a medical condition emerged that required further testing and caused him to suffer tremendously.
“As a parent I can tell you that’s horrible,” she said. “You want your kids to make friends, to fall in love, to find the career they want, and live where they want to live — I just wanted my son not to kill himself, and that was really hard.”
Beth said she eventually began sleeping on the floor outside her son’s bedroom door so she could check on him periodically and be there when he would call out for her at night.
During that time, she made it her priority to keep her son alive and didn’t really think much beyond that, she said. As a parent, she knew her son was hurting, and many times had to be a lightning rod for the emotions her son was feeling.
“He was angry, and he would lash out, usually at me, and I had to learn that that was OK. In the moment, that was all I could give him, and I had to learn that was the best in moment that I could do. I had to learn to let him be upset and angry at me because he couldn’t lash out at the person he needed to.”
Having two sons, the assault impacted the entire family. “It was just divided loyalty. There were things that I had to do and give and sacrifice for my son that was assaulted. That meant his younger brother — he lost out, too,” she said.
“I say now that I have four different sons, the two sons that were mine before this happened and the two sons I have now. It’s changed them both and it was completely out of our control.”
Beth said, despite what the “thief” who assaulted her son took from him and their family, they recognized they were very blessed to have a team of people helping them that was kind and caring and that he had a parent and a brother who believed him and supported him.
“Even when he was acting out, which he certainly did,” Beth said, “we knew it was from the assault and that was not who he was as a person.”
With the support of a therapist, she said they were able to separate those two things and realize when he was angry or hurtful it wasn’t at them.
“I think that is hard for parents sometimes or the adults in the children’s lives to realize they are so hurt they are just trying to make it,” she said.
With the help of local agencies like the CAC and others, they are going on four years since her son’s assault and life has turned around.
“Thank God I still have my son. He didn’t turn to drugs, he didn’t turn to alcohol, he didn’t kill himself. I’m thankful for that.“ she said. “I had to let go of who I thought my son was going to be. I had to let go of that and embrace who he was now. And he is a great person.”
They now work as advocates to help others recover from trauma.
Capage said when supportive parents and healthcare professionals provide help for trauma victims it helps build resilience that improves the outlook for their future.
If left to fend for themselves, Capage said the problems developed by victims can be costly not only for the individual, but the community as well.
“If they have long-term problems, these are the people that need social supports,” she said. “These are the people that we see who are homeless on the streets. These are the people we see who struggle with addiction. These are the people we see who need food pantries.
“If we can intervene when they’re kids and build resilience, we can prevent those costs down the road — those costs to society and those costs to the individuals.”
For more than two decades, the trained mental health professionals at CAC have worked with local law enforcement, prosecutors, child protective services and other professional agencies to help build resilience in child violence survivors through forensic interviews, mental health screenings and therapy.
Located at 909 Green Bag Road, in Morgantown, CAC served 455 clients in 2022 and its services are always free of charge. For more information on the agency and its services, visit moncocac.org, call at 304-598-0344 or email moncocac@comcast.net.
TWEET @DominionPostWV
