Eve-Marie says that because she was neglected she confused abuse with positive attention
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Participants have given us permission to share their experiences.
Eve-Marie grew up in chaos and neglect, with no boundaries on where she went and who she saw.
This led to her being sexually abused by numerous men, frequently in ‘plain sight’ of the adults who should have taken responsibility for her.
As an adult, Eve-Mariehas seen her childhood records, and she knows that social services were involved with her family because she and her siblings were neglected.
Her dad left home when she was about eight years old, because her mother didn’t want him there. Eve-Marie says her mother did not impose any boundaries on the children at home, or on what they did and where they went.
Eve-Marie used to spend a lot of time with another family who lived nearby. She says their house was dirty but she liked being there ‘because we could do what we wanted … it was open house, with lots of people staying’.
It was here, at the age of 11, that she was first sexually abused by an 18-year-old male. She was regularly truanting from school by this stage.
Eve-Marie says she didn’t think that what was happening to her was sexual abuse, but now realises that it was. At the time, she says, ‘I kind of felt lucky, that he was older than me and he liked me’.
Around this time, her mother was diagnosed with a serious long-term condition and the children were put into foster care.
Over the following four or five years, Eve-Marie was sexually abused by a series of men who took advantage of the fact that she had virtually no supervision by any responsible adult. Social services were involved with her family throughout this time.
The abusers included two trainee police officers who worked on a holiday for underprivileged children. ‘Another place you were supposed to be safe’ she observes. She adds that again, she was so glad to get some attention, she did not realise she was being abused.
A man who was in his 20s who lived in a hostel raped her when she was 12. Eve-Marie says she thought he was her boyfriend. She would skip school to meet him.
Eventually there was a meeting at school about her attendance. She has since read a report that says her ‘behaviour was quite provocative’. ‘That should have been a red flag’ she says, but no one talked to her about what was happening in her life. Eve-Marie was placed in another education setting but rarely attended.
In a foster placement with a family she was banned from having more than one shower a week and eating the more expensive foods that the family had. Although, she adds, the foster mother gave her cigarettes.
During her next placement, she was sexually abused by the adult brother of one of her friends and also the owner of a business where she had a Saturday job. This man gave her clothes and money, but she says, ‘No one asked me how I had all this money at 13’.
Eve-Marie continued seeing her dad during her time in care. She feels that he did his best to be a ‘good dad’ and did talk to her. He spent a lot of time playing sports, and one of the men he played with sexually abused her. This included raping her when she was 15.
Again, she says she did not realise it was abuse, but now sees that he exploited her vulnerability. ‘How was I allowed to stay at his house?’ she asks; ‘I was in foster care’.
She says that her last foster carer was responsible. ‘She wasn’t affectionate but showed she cared in other ways.’ She encouraged Eve-Marie to study and helped her find a job.
Eve-Marie feels that throughout her childhood she was continually in dangerous situations but ‘nobody cared’. She still feels let down that there were so many occasions when people could have intervened.
When she was 12 she was given the contraceptive pill at a sexual health clinic, and she regularly attended with sexually transmitted infections. She says ‘Unfortunately we had so many different social workers there was no opportunity to build a relationship’. She adds that poor communication between school and social services meant that she ‘fell through the net’.
Eve-Marie has reported the abuse she experienced to the police, but says ‘I felt they were suggesting it was untrue because it was unlikely you’d have so many experiences that weren’t linked’.
She was informed that the police could not find the perpetrators but says it took her a few minutes to find them on social media. She made an official complaint to the police about the way her case was handled but it was three years before she received a response.
Eve-Marie says there needs to be more understanding of what ‘vulnerable’ means and better safeguarding measures for those at most risk. She would like to see consistent social workers for children and young people to allow trust to be built, and more checks made on foster carers and their motives for fostering.
She says she does not want children, but if she had them ‘there is no way they’d be going off without me knowing where they were’.