The impacts of parental self-love on child safety
Written by Amanda Briggs | Originally published on Medium on December 27, 2021, now updated and archived here for ongoing access
One of the questions parents most often ask me is how they can prevent their child from experiencing sexual assault. Until somewhat recently, I would give them a list of best practices parents can implement to help keep their children safe. Over time, and as the result of many conversations with survivors and a lot of processing my childhood experiences, my answer has changed. It is not what you would think.
These days, I say the best thing a parent can do to prevent their children from experiencing sexual assault is to love themselves well.
As a parent, the best thing you can do to prevent your child from experiencing sexual assault is to love yourself well.
Hear me out. I am passionate about the topic of child safety, so this is not flippant advice.
Profound things happen when you love yourself.
You begin to speak up for yourself. You set boundaries. You grow and mature. You become more emotionally and mentally stable. Your confidence increases. You speak your truth more freely. You have more love to give others. Your empathy increases. Your awareness of yourself and others increases. You are better able to show up for yourself and those you love.
I think we can all agree these are wonderful, powerful outcomes. Here is how they help your kids:
1. When you love yourself well, you can model healthy behaviors for your children.
If your child sees you treating yourself with respect, having boundaries, and speaking up for yourself, that will become their normal. Children who are used to speaking up when something is wrong are more likely to trust you with the things they have been told to keep secret. Children who are used to adults treating themselves and others with respect will sense more red flags with someone who is not treating them with respect. Children who see you honoring your boundaries and showing them how to honor their own boundaries will be more empowered to speak up against someone who is attempting to force them to do something they do not want to do.
My biological parents did not model boundaries, respect, or empowerment. As their child, I took my cue from them. When my older brother began consistently raping me and ignored my pleas for him to stop, this registered as normal. I knew what he was doing to me was wrong, but in our household it was also normal to not be heard, respected, or empowered. I did not think there was anything I could do. He told me not to tell our parents or he would kill me. Speaking up for yourself was not valued in our home, so I did not think I would be taken seriously or helped if I did try to tell a parent.
2. When you love yourself well, you are able to build better rapport with your child.
Calm, healthy, stable adults are more likely to build relationships with their child where the child feels safe to approach their parent with difficult, embarrassing topics. It can be excruciating for a child to disclose their experience of attempted or actual sexual assault to an adult, so demonstrating you are a safe person in the small, everyday moments helps. As you invest in yourself, you might find your exhaustion decreases, your mood improves, and you have more bandwidth to show up to those tedious, everyday moments with clarity, empathy, and grace.
Both my biological parents had terrible tempers. My brother told me it would make our parents mad if I ever told them what he did to me. I witnessed several extreme temper explosions from my parents per day, so I knew what making our parents mad would look like. They had anger outbursts over small things like laundry and raking leaves, so I did not think I could trust them with a conversation as important as telling them my brother was assaulting my body.
3. When you love yourself well, you model to your child that self-love is possible, no matter what you go through.
Sexual assault survivors often struggle with self-blame, self-hatred, and depression. If your child does experience sexual assault, you can have a powerful role as a self-love guide in the aftermath. It is much easier for a child to believe they are worthy of love when they see their authority figures modeling it.
I think my biological mother hated herself. That was actually my primary takeaway from my childhood: you can never be good enough. As an adult, I look back on my mother’s attitude toward herself with sadness. But as a child, I looked up to her as an example of what I should be like. She hated herself, and she was afraid all the time. My father was also a fearful person. When they finally did learn about the rape, their response was to shame me. Looking back, I think it was because they didn’t love themselves enough to love others unconditionally or empathize with anyone about anything, let alone a little girl struggling in the aftermath of repeated rape.
Yes, I still believe using proper anatomical terms from a young age and teaching children body autonomy is crucial. However, I have realized that the most important thing a parent can do for their child is to go on a journey of self-love now — don’t wait for someday, you are worthy of your own love now — so you can model healthy behaviors for your children.
So you can model empowerment for them.
So you can build rapport.
So you can react with empathy.
So you consistently demonstrate to your child safe behaviors that increase the likelihood they will talk to you if something happens that makes them feel unsafe or uncomfortable.
So you can show up for them whole and healthy if they do experience a trauma.
Loving yourself well is a powerful investment in your child’s safety and well-being. They look up to you. They learn by observing you. Love yourself well.