Block Description: Coach your child about the dangers of keeping secrets from their parents, the worrisome occasions when keeping a secret’s actually the wrong thing to do, and how to tell the difference.
People who abuse children often employ a strategy of asking the child to “keep their secret,” or blackmailing the child by telling them how angry their parents will be. You can help your child by teaching them about the dangers of keeping secrets from their parents, when to keep a secret, the special occasions when keeping a secret’s actually the wrong thing to do, and how to tell the difference.
In this Block you will:
- Learn a little about how some people with nefarious intent might manipulate your child into keeping harmful secrets
- Help your child understand what secrets are good to keep, and what secrets are dangerous
- Help your child understand that you’re on their team, and that you want to protect them
- Encourage them to come to you about things that could be harmful secrets
This Block will take: 45 minutes
How often you should revisit this subject: This is a topic you won’t reinforce on a daily/frequent basis, so you may wish to revisit this periodically (annually or more frequently) as you feel is warranted based on your child’s age.
Where you should teach this: We all lead busy lives. For this Block, the “where” is probably less important than whether you discuss it, even if the conditions are less than ideal. As long as they’re not too distracted, not too tired, and the environment/surroundings are conducive to it – that’s a good time. It could be a conversation you have while you’re on a long drive, but if the music’s loud or their siblings are fighting, recognize that they’re probably not retaining much of the information.
Included Resources:
- The Podcast – Listen instead of read!
- Sources for more information from child abuse experts.
Why This Is Important To Teach:
This Block is a little different from most. At Building Humans we spend a lot of time focused on coaching children, but this Block is about the other aspect of the parenting role – keeping our children safe. We all want to think of our homes and families as safe places in which our children are protected from harm. However, it’s an unfortunate fact that abuse of children is all too frequent, and it’s usually not a scary stranger but someone the child knows and trusts.
We can help safeguard our children, and help reduce the duration, harm, and impact of abuse by having conversations with our kids in advance of abuse arising as an issue in our children’s lives.
The Tragic Statistics
There are many types of abuse, and not all physical abuse is sexual in nature. However, we do have some telling statistics about sexual abuse, and they’re startling. While it’s impossible to cite firm statistics that are true across all cultures, nations, and time periods, a 2009 effort by a group of researchers looking at data from 65 articles covering 22 countries concluded that over 19% of girls and over 7% of boys are sexually abused by the time they turn 18 years old. (Pereda et al, 2009) However, before we become overly hostile to strangers, we should confront another tragic and even more concerning fact – that according to Australia’s National Association for the Prevention of Childhood Abuse and Neglect, 95% percent of sexually abused children in Australia will be abused by someone they know and trust. (NAPCAN 2009) The reviews of statistics in other nations aren’t much different in this regard – it’s most often a family member or family friend.
While it’s sad that we need to have discussions about this topic with really young children who don’t even yet understand the significance of the matter, the most frequent age for children to first experience sexual assault is quite young – between 3 and 8 years in the majority of cases. (Browne & Lynch, 1994) We all need family and community, and isolating a child in an attempt to protect them from harm would also do tremendous damage. Our children will have to live and succeed in this world after we’re gone. So what can we realistically do to help our children?
A full discussion of how to prevent child abuse is beyond what we can cover in a single Block and is highly specific to your child’s age, and an array of other factors. You can help your child by ensuring they have a number of adults they feel they can confide in and who would help them, and helping them feel they have bodily autonomy – nobody is allowed to touch them under their clothes without their consent, and they shouldn’t be expected to touch others in those areas either. We’ve included some easy-reference posters with this Block for you to consider when deciding what you want to teach your children about this topic. They can be found for free at https://e2epublishing.info/free-resources#BodySafety, along with a range of books and other material helpful for parents and children on the topic of preventing abuse. However, almost every source and expert agrees that one very easy measure you can put in place is to teach your children about the danger of keeping secrets from you.
Part of intercepting harm can be focusing on finding out about it as early as possible. According to research in the Journal of Clinical Child and Adolescent Psychology, 73% of children don’t report abuse for at least a year. 45% never tell anyone for five years, and some never disclose their abuse at all. The duration of the harm and the associated feelings of helplessness and isolation only exacerbate the challenge of healing and recovery.
The good news is that there are steps you can take to encourage your children to come to you, to tell you what’s happening, and to get help early should this happen to them. Even better, the steps we’ll take help to minimize the recurrence of not just sexual abuse, but other forms of abuse as well.
We think it’s very important that children be forewarned that abusers will attempt to get them to keep a secret. Your children should know ahead of time that a potential abuser will try and convince them that their parents will be very angry if they tell you about what’s happening. By dispelling this fallacy for your child ahead of time, and by arming them with information, you stand a better chance of finding out what’s happening early and putting a stop to it.
As a side note, this is yet another reason why physical punishment like spanking, and fear-based discipline are counter-productive. If a child gets beaten when they get in trouble, they’re much more likely to go to extreme measures to avoid that outcome. It’s important that children understand that mistakes are a natural part of learning, that discipline will be done lovingly and respectfully, and that we’re on their side and want to help them.
Our goal with this Block isn’t to teach young children about sexual abuse, or warn them not to trust people, but rather to assure them that there’s nothing they can do or learn that will make you not love them or not want to help them. You don’t need your child to understand sex, sexual assault, and consent at a young age, but just to be convinced that nothing they can tell you will prevent you from helping them. Obviously, you’ll need to judge when your child is ready for this Block, as all children develop according to their own schedules and timelines. However, if your child can understand that you’re a source of unconditional safety, acceptance, and assistance, you’re probably not getting started too soon in laying the groundwork in their brains for how to address someone abusing them.
How to Teach It:
With young children, you’ll want to choose a time when they’re alert, calm, and ready to learn. Often that’s early in the morning when they’re freshly rested, and quietly attentive. You’ll want to choose your own analogies and language that works for your age, manner of speaking, culture, and relationship with your child, but the important thing is to help them understand that there’s nothing they can do that would make you not want to help them.
Talk with your child in basic, simple terms about how you love them, and would do anything to protect them.
You could say something along the lines of “Would I try to protect you from a wolf? From a bear? What about if someone was hurting you, would I want to help you then? Yeah, of course I would.”
Next, discuss things that your child would believe are unthinkably bad, and ask your child if you’d still want to help them.
“What if you got 1000 bees, and put them inside the house, and then shook the whole house! The bees would be so angry! We’d all get stung. . . . . but would I still love you and help you even if you did something like that? Yeah, of course I would, because I’m your dad. There isn’t anything you can do that I wouldn’t still love you and want to help you.”
“What if you painted every house in the city the same color, and everyone was so confused they couldn’t find their own house at night? People would be so angry! But would I still love you and help you even if you were in trouble? Yup!”
Your goal is to help your child understand that your love is unconditional, and that there isn’t anything they can do that would be so bad you wouldn’t help them. When you feel they’re understanding that point, now you can start discussing how “bad people” operate.
“What if someone told you that you shouldn’t tell your parents what you did, because I’d be really angry with you? Should you believe them? No. . . . .even if I was a upset, I’d still love you and want to help you.”
“Well, some people try to do bad things, and then tell you to keep it a secret so they don’t get in trouble. They try to make you feel like it’s your fault, and that you’ll get in trouble if you tell. But do you think that’s true? Do you think I’d help you or just yell at you if you were in trouble?”
“So why would a bad person tell you to keep a secret from Mom or Dad ? Yeah, because they know what they’re doing is bad, and they don’t want Mom and Dad to find out about it. They’re trying to get you in trouble by keeping their secret. Is that good? No, it’s not.”
Keep at this line of questioning and reasoning. Make the case with your child that no matter what they do, you’ll want to help them, and that some bad people try to use “secrets” to avoid getting in trouble. “Even if I was a upset, I’d still want to help you and make it better.”
Young children often have an innate sense of fairness and justice, and it upsets them when people violate what they view as fair or right. Once you feel this point has been made, you can put the finishing touches in place.
“What do you think you should do if someone tells you to keep a secret from Mom or Dad (or other trusted adult)? That’s right, you should come tell us right away. Are you going to remember this? You’ll remember that if anyone makes you feel really bad, or hurts you, or is saying terrible things to you, or makes you feel yucky, or does things they shouldn’t do and asks you to keep a secret or tells you that it’s your fault – it’s probably not your fault. And then what should you do? That’s right – come tell Mom or Dad (or another trusted adult) what happened. You’re very good at this!”
But What About Innocent Secrets?
Nobody expects really young children to be any good at planning surprise parties. If someone is pressuring a young child to keep a secret from their parents, it’s either laughably naive, done with bad intentions, or both. There’s very little downside to telling a young child to come to you if anyone tells them to keep a secret from their parents.
However, as children mature and have a better sense of the world, you can begin to nuance this by explaining the difference “fun secrets” and “bad secrets.”
Fun secrets are about things that will make people happy. Things like birthday parties, gifts, surprises, and things that don’t need to be a secret for a long time. Your child will naturally want to be a part of the “conspiracy” around gifts or parties.
“What if it’s your friend’s birthday party, and you know what they’re getting as a present? Is that a good secret, or a bad secret? You’re right, that’s a good secret. It’s OK to keep that kind of secret.”
“Bad secrets” are things that aren’t about giving people fun surprises. A bad secret tries to hide things that happened because people don’t want to get in trouble. Bad secrets are things that other people tell you not to tell. A bad secret keeps your child from getting help when they wish they could make something stop.
“What if an adult or someone is hurting you, or touching your body and you wish they wouldn’t, and they tell you that it should be a secret? Is that a secret to make someone happy, or so that they don’t get in trouble? You’re right! That’s the exact thing you should come talk to Mom or Dad about, because we would want to help you.”
As children age and grow in sophistication in understanding nuanced meaning, you can help them learn by playing a game where you give them a series of examples, and have them categorize them into “OK secrets” and “bad secrets.” To keep things light hearted, you can make some so ridiculous that they’re silly, and you can touch on more serious topics as you play the game. “What if someone is making you do things you don’t want to do?”
By following this framework, you’ve helped your children recognize common attempts to gain their confidence and hide information from you, and hopefully you’ll be in a position to then address the things you learn about.
Following Through
Having set up a system of understanding about how you always want to protect and help them, and secrets from their parents are harmful – you’ll want to periodically check in with them.
It’s worth noting here that even when young children can talk, and can answer direct questions, things they say need to be questioned and assessed before you believe them outright. There’s an age at which young children can be “led” to say almost anything at a certain stage of their development around language and imagination. “Do you sometimes worry about dinosaurs? Did you see a dinosaur at the park yesterday?” At certain ages children will sometimes answer in the affirmative to strange things simply out of a sense of obligation or confusion. Particularly on a topic this sensitive, their responses to loaded, direct questions can be wildly unreliable. However, you can still ensure there’s an open line of communication, and that you’re revisiting the concept and topic.
“Remember when we talked about good secrets and bad secrets? Have you kept any good secrets? What about bad secrets? Can you tell me if anyone asked you to keep a bad secret?”
“Do you remember that I love you, and will always want to help you, no matter what someone says?”
Obviously in these examples above we’ve only touched on the broad scope of things children need to know about acceptable behavior, appropriate touch, bullying, and a myriad of other topics. As they grow, you’ll want to teach them when it’s socially acceptable to keep a secret, but the general rules still apply in most situations.
When to Revisit This Topic
As your child ages, you’ll want to periodically play a game of classifying hypothetical situations into good secrets and bad secrets with additional levels of detail and specificity. Young children need more repetition on the basics of a concept, but older children need more specifics about unusual cases, exceptions to the rule, and will naturally have questions about why someone would do a thing, or what you’re alluding to. As it’s appropriate, you can explain concepts like molestation, sexual assault, abduction, bullying, and acceptable, consensual touch versus touch with inappropriate or harmful intent.
The important thing is that by taking action early, you implanted a safety feature in your child at a young age that should hopefully trip red flags for them when someone tells them to keep a secret from their parents. Your kids are lucky to have a parent like you!
Frequently Asked Questions
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