From Victim To Survivor

Women Survivors Of Female Perpetrators

Juliann Whetsell Mitchell, Jill Morse

• Publisher: Taylor & Francis
• Year: 2015
• eBook ISBN: 9781317763277
• Topic: Psychology
• Subtopic: History & Theory in Psychology
• Index: Psychology

First published in 1998. A research-based resource for helping professionals dealing with women who were sexually abused by female perpetrators, mainly mothers and grandmothers, this text focuses on the female perpetrator, defining what treatments have been found workable and providing an overview of the available literature. Secondly, the authors share the results from interviews with 85 women adult women survivors. Their journals, poems and artwork have been collated with what the women themselves have found to be both helpful and counterproductive methods of healing. The authors outline intentions and procedures for nonverbal methods of treatment that have proved effective in practice.

Chapter 1
Abusers and Survivors

Definitions of Sexual Abuse

Determining a clear-cut definition of female sexual abuse is challenging at best. There are cultural variations in what is considered abusive and nonabusive treatment of children. Finkelhor and Korbin (1988) have developed this international definition of abuse, which is applicable to all cultures: "Child abuse is the portion of harm to children that results from human action that is proscribed, proximate and preventable" (p. 3). Lawson (1993) has suggested that maternal sexual abuse should include the following categorizations: subtle, seductive, pervasive, overt, and sadistic (p. 265). She defined each of these categories as follows,

Subtle abuse is defined as behaviors that may not intentionally be sexual in nature but serve to meet the parent's emotional and/or sexual needs at the expense of the child's emotional and/or developmental needs....Seductive abuse implies conscious awareness and intention of arousing or stimulating the child sexually ... e.g., exhibitionistic display of nudity or sexual behavior; exposure to pornographic materials, etc....Abuse of the child's sexuality or perversive abuse may include behavior such as forcing the boy to wear female clothing, criticizing the child's rate of sexual development, threatening the child with fears of homosexuality....Overt sexual abuse ... behaviors included are: attempted intercourse, cunnilingus, anilingus, fellatio, genital fondling, digital penetration....Sadistic sexual abuse includes maternal sexual behavior that is intended to hurt the child and may be part of a general pattern of severe physical and emotional abuse, (pp. 265-266)

The National Committee for Prevention of Child Abuse (NCPCA, 1988) has defined child sexual abuse as occurring when "a child is used for the sexual gratification of an adult" (p. 5).

For an illustration of the silencing of victims by their perpetrators, see Figure 1.1.

Effects of Abuse

Traditionally the mother or mother-figure has been thought of as comforter, nurturer, soother, protector, and champion of her children's rights. Rarely have the words sadistic, sexually abusive, cruel, and assaultive been used to describe "normal" females involved in caretaking and caregiving roles. Most often if a female was found to be sexually abusive, she was labeled psychotic. Yet nonpsychotic mothers and other females can and do sexually, emotionally, and physically abuse both male and female children. A mother wounds and violates a sacred bond of trust when she sexually abuses her child. One of the most tragic aspects of sexual violation by a mother is the flagrant disregard of the child's attachment and trust of her. It is a fact that mothers and other females can and do commit heinous acts of violence against children's bodies, souls, and spirits.

Lori’s Story

Lori's earliest memory of abuse by her mother occurred when she was 2. This abuse was physical and violent and ended with her mother, whom Lori described as "mentally ill," cutting her internally with a kitchen knife. Lori's abuse continued until she was 14 years old. Although she was sexually abused by approximately eight people, Lori's mother was the only female abuser.

Here's what Lori had to say about the manner in which she was abused,

My mother forced me to do oral sex on her; she did the same to me several times. She inserted objects (an egg beater, toys of metal, a knife, etc.) inside of me and hurt me when she was raging. She forced me to "nurse" when I was six or seven—to stimulate her. When I was nine, she cut me internally with a razor blade when I rebelled against having my legs shaved. She screamed out that I'd injured her at birth and she wanted me to hurt and die. My mother also used the douche bag regularly to "clean me out" and called me a "whore" from age five up.

Lori's abuse occurred more than three times a week for 12 years.

Lori tried to tell her aunt in a letter about the abuse. She wrote about how much she hated her mother, but her aunt's reply was, "all adolescents go through that." Lori told no one else. Her mother threatened her life to keep Lori quiet. And, although Lori's grandmother walked in on the abuse once, no one intervened. Here's what Lori said about the event:

My grandmother witnessed my mother using the douche on me and screamed at her in Italian. I don't know what she said....She never followed through to help: the abuse went on.

Like many people who undergo traumatic events, Lori dissociated to help her deal with her mother's violent sexual abuse. She said, "I read 20 to 25 books a week and could think about the stories while being hurt, I counted tiles on the bathroom wall, patterns on the ceiling tiles; I escaped to rainbow places full of colors." Lori wrote this poem about these rainbows.

RAINBOW OF HOPE

At times when life felt ugly,
The pain too much to bear,
My thoughts would travel skyward
Toward the beauty waiting there.

The joyful burst of color,
The clouds of fluffy white,
Somehow the memory of the rainbow
Got me through the night.

You must have sent the rainbow,
To give me hope, it seems;
To show me there is beauty,
To keep alive my dreams.

Oh, God! I offer thanks,
For the sunshine and the rain,
For all the brilliant colors,
That help to ease the pain.

The thought of rainbow colors
Somehow shined right through;
And the splendor of your rainbow,
Kept me close to you.

Figure 1.1. From Victim to Survivor, by Juliann.

Figure 1.1. This first collage is surrounded on the right by many eyes. Jacobson (1986) and Cohen and Cox (1995) have demonstrated that eyes are seen often in the artwork of sexually abused women. An ear has been placed in the lower right-hand corner with two mouths screaming into it, but a hand covers the mouths and part of the ear. This is an attempt to convey the idea that the child was silenced by the perpetrators or others who chose to ignore the abuse. The silence continued is represented by the closed mouths across the bottom of the page. Moving up the left-hand side of the collage, the mouths gradually begin to open until finally the last two mouths depicted are completely open and laughing, signifying that the survivor is no longer silenced. She has reclaimed her voice, in part by telling about the abuse.

Lori's abuse ended when she was 14 years old. She felt isolated; she had no close friends. "I was non-trusting and lonely—always felt like I was on the outside," she said. Emotionally she was "withdrawn, depressed, anxious, wanted to be anonymous, yet craved love....I was in search of a real mother constantly, but didn't let myself get close enough to have a real connection."

A major problem of early maternal abuse is the failure of the mother to be connected and responsive to what her child needs or feels. Kohut (1984) contended that all children have a basic need to be mirrored. Mirroring involves the mother or other caretaker acknowledging and responding to the child's need for love and approval. The mother/caretaker mirrors adequately if she validates, admires, and understands the child as the child exists in the world. If the needs of a child are met, the child will feel good about herself. If the basic needs of the child are not met, the child often feels invalidated and unloved. When a mother/caretaker responds to a child's needs of hunger, pain, and fear, the small child learns that the world (which the mother/caretaker symbolizes) is predominantly good—that it is a "safe" place in which to exist. When a mother/caretaker pays no attention to her child's needs or repeatedly responds in ways that violate the child or are hurtful, the child learns that no place is safe or secure and that the world, more often than not, disappoints and punishes. When a mother/caretaker does not soothe or nurture the child, it may be quite difficult for the adult survivor to know how to "take care" of herself.

It is not uncommon for a person who was sexually abused and whose sense of self was violated by a mother/caretaker to find it difficult in childhood and in adulthood to trust others—whether the person be a significant other, a therapist, a support group member, or even a friend, Erikson (1950) has stated that an individual needs to form a basic trusting relationship with at least one individual who assumes a caretaking role in order to progress through the other developmental stages. When a mother is not able to accept the child as she is, the child may reach adulthood feeling as if she has no inner self and is of little value. Because the mother/caretaker continually invalidated what she was experiencing as a child, the adult survivor may lack the ability to trust her thoughts and feelings and may seek out external others to tell her how she feels, what to do, and how to respond.

One participant in this study discussed the "unreality" of her experiences: "I usually think I'm lying. When I believe it, I recoil in horror of what happened. I feel devastated."

Another survivor commented, "I am still blaming myself and am having a great deal of trouble accepting my returning memories. But I feel relief to know there is a reason for why I have felt so worthless."

Finally, one woman responded by stating, "I feel that it's surprising I am alive. I have survived my own personal Holocaust. I survived satanic ritual abuse. Few people will experience in a lifetime the suffering I endured in just one year of my childhood."

Attachment Theory

British psychiatrist John Bowlby has written extensively on attachment theory. He contends that attachment is a biological bond between caregiver and child. This attachment relates to survival needs:

Thus attachment behaviour is conceived as a class of behaviour distinct from feeding behaviour and sexual behaviour and of at least an equal significance in human life. There is nothing intrinsically childish or pathological about it ... the individual who shows attachment behaviour is usually referred to as child and the attachment figure as mother....When mother is present or her whereabouts well-known and she is willing to take part in friendly interchange, a child usually ceases to show attachment behavior and, instead, explores his environment. In such a situation mother can be regarded as providing her child with a secure base from which to explore and to which he can return, especially should he become tired or frightened. (Bowlby 1979, pp. 131-132)

Other attachment behaviors in the infant include crying, smiling, walking, crawling, and saying the name of the caregiver or calling for her. These attachment behaviors are attempts on the part of the child to engage the caregiver or to stay close enough to her so that she can be seen by the child (Bowlby, 1977). Biringen (1994) said,

Although parental attachment may exist from earlier on, the child's attachment to the primary caregiver (usually the mother) develops slowly, taking typically six months to establish a preferential relationship to that caregiver, (p. 405)

He continued,

Once a normative attachment to the mother is established, the infant uses the mother as a secure base from which to explore the environment (Ainsworth, 1982). Because the infant feels safe and secure in the context of the mother's presence, he or she is able to go some distance from the mother and explore freely, (p. 405)

Part of Bowlby's theory was termed "the internal working model" by Main and Goldwyn (1984), According to this model, the development of the personality is based on a child's first experiences with the primary caregiver. The baby forms ideas about herself based on how she connects to others: If her needs are met, she learns she is of value and merits the care of others; if her needs are ignored, she learns she has little value.

Throughout the early developmental phases, the child learns how to take care of herself and how to care for others based on how she is treated by the attachment figure. This "internal working model" is composed of both thinking and feeling parts. Alexander (1992) wrote, "Therefore, the internal working model is both affected by and comes to affect the types of interpersonal experiences that are encoded into the concept of the self' (p. 186).

After the baby becomes attached to the primary caregiver, she uses this caregiver as a safe foundation from which to investigate her surroundings (Ainsworth, 1982). If the baby feels protected while the caregiver is in close proximity, she is capable of moving away from...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Contents
• ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
• BACKGROUND INFORMATION AND DATA SOURCES
• CHAPTER 1 ABUSERS AND SURVIVORS
• CHAPTER 2 DISSOCIATIVE IDENTITY DISORDER
• CHAPTER 3 MEMORY
• CHAPTER 4 MUNCHAUSEN-BY-PROXY SYNDROME
• CHAPTER 5 SELF-INJURY
• CHAPTER 6 SURVIVORS' SEXUALITY AND IDENTITY DEVELOPMENT
• CHAPTER 7 FEMALE PERPETRATORS
• CHAPTER 8 VERBAL TREATMENT MODALITIES: GIVING VOICE TO THE TRAUMA
• CHAPTER 9 NONVERBAL TREATMENT MODALITIES: GIVING FORM TO THE TRAUMA
• APPENDIX A RELEASE OF INFORMATION FORM
• APPENDIX B QUESTIONNAIRE
• APPENDIX C SUMMARY OF DATA
• APPENDIX D RESOURCES
• BIBLIOGRAPHY
• INDEX
• ABOUT THE AUTHOR