By David M. Allen, M.D.
One of the things that child abuse deniers like the False Memory Syndrome Foundation focus on, besides child abuse apologist Elizabeth Loftus’s irrelevant arguments about the unreliability of memory (more on that at the end of the post), is the fact that many adults who claim to have been victims of incest as children did not tell any other adults about it at the time the alleged incidents took place.
Some children do tell. So why wouldn’t the others?
May logical-sounding explanations have been advanced to explain why not. In an article in the December 2010 issue of Psychiatric Times, Richard Kluft lists several of them: incomprehension, shame, fear of retaliation, and the misperception that the child is to blame. He also mentions loyalty conflicts, but more on that shortly.
Share This Post!
The Link Between ADHD and Trauma
By Medical News Today Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is a common neurodevelopmental disorder that often begins in childhood. Studies have found that trauma occurring in childhood may exacerbate or predict [...]
5 Reasons Why We Blame Ourselves After Trauma
By Kaytee Gillis, LCSW-BACS As a therapist who works with survivors of childhood trauma, I find that self-blame is a common part of their experience. As a survivor myself, I experience [...]
Child-Parent Psychotherapy Resources
By University of California, San Francisco Child-Parent Psychotherapy (CPP) is an intervention model for children aged 0-5 who have experienced at least one traumatic event (e.g. maltreatment, the sudden or traumatic [...]
Caring for Caregivers Experiencing Secondary Trauma
By Heather C. Forkey, MD, Elaine Schulte, MD, MPH, and Luanne Thorndyke, MD Secondary traumatic stress (STS) is the emotional duress caused by indirect exposure to distressing events experienced by others. [...]
How to Talk About Mental Health
By SAMHSA Mental health is essential to a person’s life in the same way as physical health. Hesitation to talk about mental health adds to the notion that the topic is [...]
Prioritizing Minority Mental Health
By CDC Office of Health Equity Mental health matters! Mental health includes our emotional, psychological, and social well-being. It affects how we think, feel, act, handle stress, relate to others, and make [...]