“He made me lick his stinker,” my 4-year-old baby boy whined, frustrated after a coughing fit. “Stinker” was the word he used for penis. He was sitting in between us on our front porch swing, enjoying an unusually warm Saturday morning in March.
My husband and I looked at each other, then I asked him to repeat what he had just said. “Bobby* made me kiss and lick his stinker!” My husband and I looked at each other again as the realization of what our little boy had just told us hit us like a ton of bricks.
“We need to tell Jane*,” I whispered to my husband, but our little boy heard me and exclaimed “No!”
This was how we learned of the abuse that was being perpetrated on our little boy. In his 4-year-old words, but in no uncertain terms, our little boy had just told us that our babysitter Jane’s husband had made him kiss and lick his penis.
I can’t begin to explain the range of thoughts and emotions that ran through my head as this revelation sank in. My heart was racing and I started to shake. My husband and I just went to our room, shut the door, and wondered what on earth to do with what we had just learned. Our heads were spinning. I was lightheaded. Should we call the babysitter? Will she believe us?
I can only describe the sequence of events that immediately followed on that day as completely orchestrated by God. It was as if God swept us up and took over the moment our little boy made his abuse known. Not five minutes after we came back inside to try to make sense of what we had just learned, my sister-in-law called the house. She never really had any reason to call on a Saturday morning, but when she called, my husband told her what our little boy had just said. “You have to call Gavin*!” she said. Gavin was the sheriff, and also a personal friend.
Suddenly, the magnitude of what we now knew started sinking in. This was a huge deal, and we needed to call law enforcement. Right then, as we still had my sister-in-law in the phone, another law enforcement friend of ours happened to have been coming down the road. Again, there had been no reason for him to have come over that day, but there he appeared. We ran out and waved him down, and told him what our little boy had just said. “What do we do?” we asked. Our friend immediately got on the phone and mobilized others in law enforcement who dealt with this type of situation.
Within an hour, the sheriff and a child abuse detective were at our house. Our heads were still spinning. All of this was happening so fast, yet I remember feeling numb. The detective asked so many questions about what our little boy had said, he wanted exact statements. He also asked about our other kids. Had they ever mentioned anything about our babysitter’s husband? We pulled our older son and daughter aside and asked point blank if Bobby had ever touched them or made them do anything they had felt uncomfortable with. At first they said no, but as the day went on, my daughter did admit that she remembered one time when he had unzipped his pants and rubbed his penis on her back when she was 5, while they were watching Barney. She even described the dress she was wearing that day. “Oh my God,” I thought. I couldn’t take it.
It then came time for the sheriff and detective to talk to our little boy all by himself, to see if he could tell them in his own words what Bobby had made him do. They sat in our office. I stood right on the other side of the wall, looking at my husband, who was hidden around another wall but peeking at our boy. Without hesitation, our little boy said the same thing he had said to us. “Bobby made me kiss and lick his stinker. It made me choke!” He was mad! I’ll never forget the look on our friend Gavin’s face, the sheriff, when he heard that come out of our baby’s mouth, so plainly like that. I could see him out of the corner of my eye. Then I looked at my husband, tears just running down his face. That’s a scene I will never forget.
When the detective finished talking to our little boy, he made some phone calls and arranged for us to visit a child advocacy center the following morning, for the purpose of interviewing our kids again and getting on tape exactly what happened, in their own words. Then he and the sheriff left.
That night was torture. After the kids were in bed and the house was finally quiet, my husband and I held each other and sobbed as the gravity of the situation continued to sink in. What were the signs we didn’t see or chose to ignore? It’s our kid’s word against this man and his family, who were part of our very small, tight-knit community. They sat at the front of church every Sunday and participated in many community events. What if this didn’t really happen the way we think it did? THERE’S A TRAIN COMING THAT’S ABOUT TO DESTROY THAT FAMILY AND THEY DON’T EVEN KNOW IT!
But we knew the truth. A 4-year-old doesn’t just come up with something like that without having seen or experienced it. No child would. So we prayed. We lifted up the entire situation to God and asked that His will be done. We prayed for our little boy and our family. We prayed for our babysitter and her family. We had no idea of the events that still lay before us. We just held each other and prayed.
For the record, our babysitter, who had run a home daycare for many years, never had a clue this was going on. Her husband took advantage when he was left in charge of the kids during the seldom occasions she had to run errands during the day. She never left without asking us parents if it was okay that she left our kids with her husband while she quickly ran out. There at the end, he had been left in charge more often as she had to take care of an ailing family member. More opportunities to be alone with my little boy.
Our story did have a good ending, if you can call anything about it good. Our babysitter’s husband was found guilty of 13 counts of first-degree child molestation and four counts of statutory sodomy. He had actually admitted to molesting over 40 kids over a 30-year period, including his own son, who is now grown. As details about the molestation came to light, we realized that this man used our children, our precious innocent babies, as sex toys for his pleasure. There were eight hours of taped confession where he described in detail how he used our kids. The youngest one molested was 9 months old! What was more astounding to me was the fact that he didn’t seem to understand what he did was wrong. He said he had just “messed” with our little boy, no big deal. He honestly thought he would be able to come home after he confessed and it would all be back to normal.
Many of the other victims are now grown and didn’t want to be in on our case against him, I suppose because they didn’t want to open old wounds. His own son to this day won’t admit that his father did anything to him. Maybe it’s embarrassment, maybe shame, or maybe fear.
My husband and I learned many lessons from this experience. First, don’t dismiss your instinct. If something about a person bothers you, don’t ignore it. In hindsight, I can honestly say I had reservations about this man from day one. But you know what? So did my mom! The first time she met my babysitter and her husband when my daughter was a year old, she told me to keep an eye out. At the time I brushed it off because my own in-laws were the ones who had referred them to us, and I respected their opinion. The abuse came to light a full 10 years later.
Then there was an incident a few weeks before this all came out that seemed very odd. My husband had come in to pick up our little boy as usual, and Bobby was just sitting there, stone-faced and quiet. My husband tried to make small talk, but he didn’t want to talk. So he got our little boy and left. We’ve since figured out that that must have been the final time the abuse happened. It must have been when Bobby took it too far and ejaculated into our little boy’s mouth, choking him and making him think he puked on his Thomas Train shirt. I’m sure he thought he might be found out. We do think that must have been the main experience that jarred our little boy, causing him to get frustrated and tell us what happened when he had the coughing fit on our swing.
Second, pay close attention when your children do or act in ways that don’t seem normal for their age. Around the holidays the year before, our little boy started with the habit of putting my husband’s index finger in his mouth, and making it go in and out. Of course, the first thing that came to mind when I saw him do that was that it looked like he was giving a blow job. I remember even asking him why he was doing that, but he would only smile and giggle. I kick myself now for not having probed further.
I also want to bring up my middle son. While he’s never mentioned anything unusual happening to him at the hands of our babysitter’s husband, we went through a really hard spell with him when he was about 5. He was never the easiest kid, but he began talking about death and dying all the time. No matter how much we tried to reassure him that he was a great kid, he would just say he deserved to die. That just didn’t seem normal for a 5-year-old. We did take him to counseling over it. And once he started school, he came out of it. But I can’t help but wonder in there’s something there, deep down, that’s repressed.
That being said, we’re still traveling down the journey of abuse, even though the actual events are finished. In the first few years after it ended, there were several times when our little boy would make a reference to what Bobby had done. It was always during the most random times. One time we were all taking a walk together and, just like that, he said, “Bobby peed in my mouth.” There was another time about a year after that when he was sitting with me outside while I worked in our garden, and he said, “Did you know Bobby is in jail?” It made us realize that these memories seemed to lie just under the surface.
The counselor who helped us during that first year said that our goal was to get our little boy to the point where these memories didn’t evoke major emotion anymore. So in the instances when he’s brought it up, we simply talk through it on his level as normally as if we were talking about what we should have for dinner.
“Yes, Bobby “peed” in your mouth. What he did was wrong and he got in very big trouble for it.”
“Yes, Bobby’s in jail. Do you know why? Because people who break the law go to jail.” Then on to the next subject.
I’m sure the day will come when our little boy will actually realize what happened to him. Maybe our middle son will also have something to say. That’s why I say our journey of abuse didn’t end when Bobby went to jail.
Third, don’t blame each other. If the abuse was perpetrated by someone other than your partner, don’t point the finger. I can’t imagine how I could have gotten through this without the love and support of my husband. When one of us was down in the darkest pit of despair, the other would always be there to help the other through. Another set of parents whose two young kids were also victims wasn’t so lucky. They divorced over this experience, sadly, because they blamed.
Finally, don’t accept what your lawyer tells you unless you’re comfortable with it. Our lawyer initially wanted to plea bargain our case, which would have resulted in a much lesser sentence for Bobby. But we parents, along with Jane our babysitter (and Nancy Grace in our back pocket!), refused the plea bargain and opted for a trial. That may have been a risky move on our part, but we needed to do all we could to gain justice for what happened to our kids.
It’s been four years since our little boy’s abuse ended. He’s now 8. While he still does ask why we don’t get to visit Jane anymore, I have to say I believe the memories of abuse may have faded considerably. Maybe it’s my own wishful thinking, but he hasn’t made random comments for a couple years now. In fact, just a few months ago when he mentioned again about visiting Jane, I asked if he remembered Bobby. He looked at me with a perplexed look on his face and said, “Who’s Bobby?”
If his memories do remain, my hope as a victim of child sexual abuse myself is that he’ll realize his experience of abuse doesn’t define who he is. As traumatizing as it might have been, that he’ll know what an adoring, funny, amazing boy he’s growing up to be, who just happens to be a victim of abuse. My hope is also that he’ll realize his parents listened and acted immediately to stop the abuse, and, that they never wished evil on Bobby, simply justice for what he did. His real judgment is in God’s hands.
In the particular region where we live, child sexual abuse is appallingly rampant. The notion that “messing with children” is no big deal seems to have been quietly accepted until very recently. My babysitter’s husband was himself abused as a boy, by his uncle. But our abuse story rocked our community to the core and brought this very real issue to light. Thankfully, it’s now talked about very openly among teens, parents and groups in the community. I think we were all forced to stare right into the face of this sad reality, but the fruits of our experience are that parents and kids are fighting this issue by talking about it. Talking is so key.
Many have told us what a little hero we have in our son, for his bravery in telling it like it was. I personally think the way it all came out had to be part of God’s plan. For whatever reason, all those kids before him never said a thing. That breaks my heart. I hate that it had to be my little boy, but finally, the cycle of abuse at the hand of this man is over.
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