Stephanie applies her experiences of sexual abuse to deliver prevention education in schools
All names and identifying details have been changed.
Participants have given us permission to share their experiences.
Stephanie grew up in a Catholic family. She was sexually abused by a relative for many years, starting when she was a small child.
She was subjected to further sexual abuse by three more perpetrators, including a priest. She believes that her early experiences made her confused and vulnerable to other abusers.
The first person who sexually abused Stephanie was her uncle. He lived nearby and Stephanie remembers that after his wife died, she spent time with him alone at his home. He used to buy her lots of sweets and get her to sit on his lap. She recalls waking up in bed and finding him beside her, naked. He kissed her when she left.
This abuse continued until she was 14 years old and during this time, when she was about 10, the priest from the church that the family attended, Father Y, began sexually abusing Stephanie. She remembers him kissing her and trying to put his tongue in her mouth. On another occasion, when he was visiting the family, he came into her bedroom when she was ill. He said that her mother had asked him to check on her, and he touched her breasts.
She remembers how uncomfortable she was, but felt she couldn’t challenge him. She recalls speaking with a friend about Father Y and thinks other people may have known about what he was doing.
Stephanie endured further sexual abuse by a close member of her family. She says that her abuser was himself sexually abused by Father Y. This abuse began when she was 11 years old and continued for about three years. She recalls asking for a lock on her bedroom door when she was about 12, to keep him out. Her mum said she ‘would speak to him’, but the abuse continued.
The fourth person who sexually abused Stephanie was a man who was one of several ‘army friends’ at a party held by a relative. It occurred when she was 12 years old and staying on holiday with the relatives. During the night of the party, one of the guests came to her bedroom and sexually abused her.
She remembers lying on her front to try to prevent him touching her but he overpowered her. She says she was scared and felt she had to ‘go along with it’. She describes trying to clean herself all the next day to get the abuse out of her system.
She also describes times during her childhood when she tried to prevent abuse by ‘making myself physically disgusting … I refused to wash to make myself horrible’.
Stephanie reported the sexual abuse she suffered on two occasions. When she was 14 she tried to talk to a teacher, but they seemed not to believe her and suggested she was ‘creating these dramas’ to make herself more interesting.
About two years later she called Childline, who advised her to tell her mum. She did this, and when confronted, the close family member confessed to the abuse. She adds that her family say they recall her saying at the time that she never wanted to talk about it again.
Stephanie says that as an adult she has thought she must have been ‘giving off signals’ to the abusers ‘otherwise, how would they know they could do this to me?’.
She feels she is unable to ‘read sexual signals’ and is hypervigilant. She has been physically damaged by the abuse and physical intimacy is difficult. She has never been in a long-term relationship and says she often deliberately jeopardises relationships before they can progress.
She has also used drugs and drink. She has seen several different counsellors and feels some of the counselling has been helpful.
She has a child and she started talking to them about sexual abuse from an early age. She remains close to her mum but feels that if her parents had known how to manage it when she told them about the abuse, things might have been different for her.
Stephanie works in education delivering prevention work relating to child sexual abuse. Because of her experiences she feels very strongly about helping children to stay safe.
She would like teaching children how to protect themselves against sexual abuse to be compulsory, as part of the Personal Social Education curriculum, from reception stages in education.
She believes there should be strong systems in place in schools to deal with disclosures of abuse by children, and that counselling should always be free and offered to victims and survivors of abuse.