Five books on parenting care for girls
I have written copiously about the abuse of girls, young women and adult females. I doubt that there has ever been a time in my writing life that I have kept quiet on this issue. It bothers me a lot because women all over the world are meant to be the arrow heads of stability […]
I have written copiously about the abuse of girls, young women and adult females. I doubt that there has ever been a time in my writing life that I have kept quiet on this issue. It bothers me a lot because women all over the world are meant to be the arrow heads of stability in families and homes. A lot of times, you watch a young woman, a young girl, a mother even a grandmother behaving badly. Most times, no one knows their childhood journey. I mean there are badly behaved women who are just badly behaved, self centered, difficult to manage, quarrelsome unmanageable and unkind. However, there is a percentage that behave in this manner from having been messed up as children or as young persons. This week’s column is a direct reaction to sexual and emotional abuse of young girls and as we also now know of young boys but today we are talking about women.
One of last week’s breaking news in America’s entertainment industry is in relation to this issue and it is really not new anywhere in the world including Nigeria. Infact it is the elephant in the room and we all seem to be going about our business as if it’s not happening. That elephant is incest; when a young girl is taken advantage of by a family member. Last week, a famous American singer and Talk show hostess Tamar Braxton said in an interview that she was sexually abused on both sides of her family severally, not once, not twice. All those angry out bursts that she has, her occasional anti-social behavior and difficulty in relationships are consequences of the abuse she talks about.
Sometimes, some mothers are aware and they keep quiet. In doing so they gift us the damaged girl who takes her damage into a marriage, into the world, into communities. There are too many broken women in the world. How are you as a parent contributing? Bringing up a girl child is more than sending her to school, teaching her how to cook. You also need to protect her from male predators and teach her to be alert, to understand inappropriate behavior towards her and her body. You also have to stand in the gap for her and teach her the ways of the world. You have to protect her from your driver, your cooks, your gardeners. You have to protect her from her uncles, no matter how nice. You have to keep a close watch on her teachers, your religious adviser, pastor, priest or Imam, her game master, her bosses. You have to teach her what it means to be touched in places she does not like by a man even if that man were her father or step father. Care must also be taken when it comes to the internet, many young girls are in there, many sick sexual offenders and predators are there as well. You must also listen to your children, what are they saying, what are they not saying. How are they behaving, how are they changing?
We are all students in this journey of parenting young girls. Here are five books to help us manage the elephant in the room and to give us some education and information that we all desperately need for a better world.
1) Predators: Pedophiles, Rapists and other Sex offenders by Anna Salter. This book shows the sophisticated deception techniques that most sex offenders use. What motivates sexual abuse? Why are so few caught? The author shares the stories of many of these offenders and how you can be living with them or they are not far and you do not know. She also gives us the tools to protect ourselves and our children from them.
2) Protecting the Gift by Gavin de Becker. All parents face the same challenges when it comes to their children’s safety, whom to trust, whom not to trust, what to believe, what to fear and what not to fear. This book gives practical new steps to enhance children’s safety at every level and gives us guiding tools to look out for our children.
3) Childhood. It should not hurt written by Clare Reeves who is also the founder of Mothers against sexual Abuse in America. This is a book on the elephant in the room. It focuses on disturbing issues of incest and child sexual abuse. It is the greatest hidden epidemic in America but it is even in Nigeria. This book teaches us how to get information and how to recognize the signs and symptoms. It also gives us insights on what to do if a child has already become a victim. It also contains valuable advice on how to survive abuse. It is also a book for all adults concerned about the safety of our children.
4) Online Child Sexual Abuse: Grooming, Policing and Child Protection in a Multi-Media World written by Elena Martellozo. This book addresses the complex multifaceted and at times counter-intuitive relationships between on-line growing behaviors, risk assessment, police practices and the actual dangers of subsequent abuse in the physical world. We all know what happens to rape victims in some police stations in Nigeria and how a lot of young girls on the internet seeking attention follow an internet boyfriend. Very disturbing.
5) Body Safety Education by Jayneen Sanders. This is a step by step guide for parents and Cares on how to protect children from sexual abuse through personal body education.