The neighborhood that my family is fortunate enough to live in could be mistaken for one from a scene in Pleasantville. The children run and play safely in the street and all of the backyards meet in a way that one cannot be differentiated from another. Our 2 year old is among the youngest on our quaint block, and still the older children include him without question or prejudice.
With our own and this tight knit group of children in mind, we recently purchased a trampoline. We had predetermined that the other children would be welcome to use it as long as we spoke to and were given the ‘okay’ by their parents. After what I can only assume was relentless harassment from their kids, all the parents made their way to our backyard where we introduced ourselves and received permission for their children to play at our house. All but one…
A single father of three beautiful and polite little girls could not be persuaded to leave his home. It seemed to be an inconvenience to meet the people with whom his daughters would spend a good portion of their summer days. Instead, he sent them to me with a note declaring that he understood that the “risk” was his own for the girls to play on our trampoline.
My annoyance with this man quickly turned to sadness and then to anger for his carelessness in the protection of what are certainly his most priceless creations. I was tempted to march down to his doorstep and inform him of the “risk” he is taking by blindly trusting people he doesn’t know to watch over his children. I wanted him to understand that bruises and hurt feelings are the very least of what he is risking.
Many people mistakenly assume that a sexual predator looks a certain way, lives in a certain part of town, preys on the children of people we read about in the news, not the ones that we tuck into bed every night. They assume that sexual predators are sketchy looking old men that stalk kids home from school in windowless minivans. Unbeknownst to most, this way of thinking is the greatest risk we are taking when it comes to our children.
The sexual predator I knew was a young woman. A neighbor. The beautiful, friendly, well-spoken daughter of our mailman. What started as an innocent admiration for someone much older and cooler than myself, gradually turned into grooming and then into sexual abuse. My humiliation and fear of punishment lasted long after the abuse ended. It wasn’t until many years later that I confessed to my parents the events that had occurred.
In hindsight, this very preventable and unfortunate series of events have made me a more tentative and cautious parent than I otherwise might have been. My experiences serve as proof of the danger of misplaced trust and as a constant reminder of how great a loss can result of seemingly small risks.
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*Due to the sensitive nature of this content, we respectfully post it with anonymity. We sincerely thank the contributor for sharing insight into such an emotional and raw life event.
