Bear to listen

For more than 25 years I’ve worked with survivors of abuse.

There have been so many times when my experience as a professional has mirrored that of survivors telling their story.

I see it in people’s eyes.

They say ‘I don’t want you to tell me this’, ‘Please don’t tell me any more’ and ‘I can’t cope, stop please’.

So I do, but it only contributes to the silence.

This happens to me, and I know it happens to actual survivors; people who have to break through so many more barriers to be able to speak.

The hurt I feel, as someone who has not had my rights and individuality utterly smashed is a real thing, but it is miniscule I know. It stops me in my tracks.

Today a report is being launched here in UK that speaks of the experience of survivors of childhood abuse. It says that only one in eight survivors of abuse come to the attention of the authorities and this is why.

The issue of being unbelieved and the silencing that occurs even when survivors are believed is a huge factor in this under-reporting.

Please bear it.

When someone begins to attempt to tell you of the unspeakable things that have happened to them, please recognise that your dicomfort at hearing these words is literally nothing in comparison to theirs to say them.

I use the term ‘unspeakable’ with care and thought. There are often actually no words to say it, and if there are, it is likely that the person has been told many many times that they must never tell.

It is all very well if you are an adult who has never been terrified of being obliterated to think ‘I don’t want to hear this’, but please be aware of the consequences of that for someone who as a child was told, by people who they should have been able to trust, that they must never ever tell.

That is one reason that one of the techniques I use is play.

It means that no words have to be used. A mess can be made in the sand that describes things far easier. A story can be told without words using the materials we have at hand and shown.

Articulating this pain is difficult for me, and I have never experienced it.

Please have compassion, consider how difficult it must be to find the words and create a space for them to be said.