Definition of Child Sexual Abuse

There is no uniform definition pertaining to child sexual abuse. But the characteristic feature of child sexual abuse is the dominant position of an adult that allows him or her to force or coerce a child into sexual activity.

Child sexual abuse may include fondling or playing with the genitals of a child, anal intercourse, oral-genital contact, vaginal penetration, masturbation, digital penetration and touching of private parts (including breasts).

Child sexual abuse does not only mean physical contact. It involves abuse in the form of non-contact that involves exposure, voyeurism and child pornography. It includes abuse by Peers too.

There are incidents when your own family member could be involved in this issue. Before the situations turns murkier transforming your family including personal life in to a nightmare, tackle this entire issue with deftness and firmness, accompanied with patience and composure of mind. Avoid taking abrupt decisions. Remember that this is a social issue of prime importance. Never shove such incidents under the carpet-even though it may involve your own kith and kin.

Steps in dealing with the issue of Child Sexual Abuse by a Family Member

• Accept the fact that your child has been sexually abused.
• Face the reality
• To take charge of the situation.
• Discuss this topic with your family members who support the abuse of your child.
• Be calm and composed in your approach while dealing with the issue.
• Trash out the outstanding issue pertaining to sexual abuse with the concerned member of the family involved.
• Adopt a balanced and pragmatic approach pertaining to the issue of child sexual abuse.
• Sternly warn the concerned person in the family regarding the grave consequences incase if further sexual abuse of the child continues, by keeping a tab on the activities family member.
• Discuss this issue with your family physician and counselor.
• Counsel the concerned person (abuser) involved in child sexual abuse.
• Analyze the mindset of the abuser and the reason for committing such a heinous crime on the child.
• Provide ample support and counsel the child.
• Shower abundant love and repose confidence on your child. Lend your ears to her grievances.
• Never leave your child alone or let him/her feel lonely.
• Give ample time to the child to overcome the trauma. 
• Take preventive measures to see that such an incident does not re-occur again.
• Report abuse to your local child protection service agency and ask about crisis support help.

It can be hard for adults if the abuser is close to them. Still, the abuse should be reported to your local child protection agency or family-physician. It is the best method to deal with the issue of child-abuse within your own family.

Dr Sameer

Child sexual abuse is the most horrific abuse perpetrated on unsuspecting children and has the potential to erase the essence of childhood—happiness and trust. Child sexual abuse is a significant dimension of child abuse that is brought into focus each year on November 19, the day earmarked as World Day for Prevention of Child Abuse.

Appropriate and timely intervention can help ease the pain and set the child on the road to recovery. It requires a multi disciplinary approach involving doctors, the police and social workers to achieve a holistic healing in the affected child. In developing countries where child abuse, though rampant, is only now coming into public focus, there is no planned intervention to address this issue at the practical level.

Case in point is this unspeakable horror that a 5-year-old had to face on her way back home from school in a suburb in a South Indian state. A man offered to ride her home on his bicycle. Trusting him, the little girl went with the man who took her to a secluded spot. He raped her and ran away when the child started screaming. The girl was too young to realize what happened to her and there was nobody for help in the vicinity. Bleeding, she limped home and could only tearfully tell her worried parents that “a man lay on her and pushed something long and hard into her private part.”

The worst was yet to come. The parents who were poor construction workers took her to a nearby clinic that couldn’t handle the situation and sent them to a police station to file a complaint, which they did. They went to 3 hospitals who didn’t want to take the case but the third hospital kindly put them in an ambulance and sent them to a fourth hospital which refused admission and sent them back to the third hospital, which, by then had a senior doctor who had arrived, and took in the child immediately. It was 1 am in the night by then.

At that point in time when the child was semiconscious, the police dragged in a “suspect” for the child to identify. The doctor sent them packing. All this happened in 2005. The family has since then moved to a different locality and trying to forget the nightmare. The case however remains open and each time the police station sees a new person in-charge, the family is approached for details. The girl is now nine years old and is asked to identify a man who sexually abused her when she was 5-years-old!

Can there be a more crass case of handling such a sensitive issue pertaining to a child? Intervention that is inappropriate and untimely can be more painful than the primary abuse. Abused children are looking to a kinder world that will respond to their silent shout for help in a responsible way.