Human Trafficking Damage Awareness Month
January is human trafficking (damage) awareness month. This subject is very important to me. So much so, that I am sometimes drawn into discussions concerning victims who are also perpetrators of other crimes.
Victim/Offender
I committed petty theft, participated in breaking and entering, and auto theft as a young teen. I do not condone any of these crimes. This is not normal behavior. It was wrong and I was arrested. If kids are acting out, there’s a reason. It could be early childhood trauma. In my case, the core violation of child sexual abuse damaged the structures in my brain that connects emotion and cognition. I stopped thinking and dreaming about the future. I didn’t want to live to see a future.
By thirteen years old, I had attempted suicide. By sixteen, I’d tried different ways a few times. I had been raped many times, beaten, abandoned, in and out of foster care, and frequently trafficked for sex. I ran drugs, delivered piles of cash, being used and abused by men from all walks of life. From blue collar workers to at least one city council member, police, a doctor, teacher, business owners, and international travelers, None of the men who purchased me for sex cared that I was underage. They did not see me as a person. I was an implement to be used for their sexual gratification.
Healing is Possible
By eighteen, I was pregnant. For me, saving my baby saved my life. My buyer said he’d kill me if I didn’t abort, but God made a way of escape. One special social worker helped me devise a plan. She found a safe house for me. There, I learned how to think and how to communicate. I learned how to calm myself and change my destructive, negative thoughts. It wasn’t easy, but with help, I forgave my abusers.
Just as a broken bone requires intervention, so too, does the trauma of abuse. We may not recognize it without education. However, it’s easier to spot with the right knowledge. Trauma from child abuse has markers. As adults, you and I can make a difference. It takes time and intentional effort.
Early childhood trauma literally shrinks the connective structures that help us develop executive reasoning skills. Executive thinking that contemplates repercussions and consequences naturally develops through our teen years and early twenties. When the structures in the center of our brains shrink back, the emotion and thinking centers are disconnected.
This is why people with high adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) may act out or dramatically turn inward. They may seek drugs or substances or experiences; anything to try to feel different. Many engage in self harm. They may not even be able to recognize what is good or bad.
Human Trafficking Damage
Child sexual abuse and human trafficking damage cannot be dismissed. The damage is far too great.
Some of us heal and develop executive reasoning skills and some do not. There are some child sexual abuse and trafficking survivors who cannot plan, keep a job, maintain relationships, manage their emotional status. They cannot think about the future, even in terms of having hopes or dreams. Of course, with treatment and intensive help, some may be able to begin healing, but others are too damaged to be a fully competent member of society. They require help long term.
Warehousing people with mental ill health isn’t a solution, but perhaps emptying and closing all the sanatoriums wasn’t either. Some people need more than one-hour outpatient sessions once per week. They may slip through the cracks and become a violent aggressor. I hope our justice systems can someday be attuned to meeting the needs of survivors of abuse while also keeping innocent people safe.
If you have contact with courts or court personnel, there are programs designed to help victims of trauma through the justice system. These educate court personnel about how to spot victims and survivors of severe adverse childhood experiences and trauma from human trafficking.
Human trafficking includes labor and sex trafficking, as well as, the harvesting of human organs. Our federal government declares, “sex trafficking is a severe form of trafficking.” The damage is intensely complex, because it is a core violation.
Damage Perpetuated
We hope and pray that victims and survivors of horrific abuse are discovered and helped before they become violent perpetrators, themselves.
If you are suffering from childhood trauma, please know there is hope for your future. With help, you can heal.
Perhaps, you can be the one who intercedes for a child. Maybe, your kind words will give someone hope.
Today, in the US, we still incarcerate far too many young people. What ideas do you have for how we might change this?
What would you add to the conversation?