National Child Abuse Prevention Month and Actual Prevention

April is National Child Abuse Prevention Month. Not quite sure how to prevent child abuse, because if it is prevented how do we know it was going to happen in the first place?

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There are houses around my daughter’s elementary school, with yards full of little sheds and beat up campers and vehicles and such. And do you know what I think each day that I pick her up? That in any one of those yards, some psychopath could be holding captive another Jaycee Dugard. Weird, I know, and not likely. I often wonder since she was found if I would’ve been like the neighbors that knew someone was living in the tents in the backyard, but didn’t say anything. In fact, there’s a good chance I would be.

In my world, I let people be. Your business is your business. As long as I don’t think you’re hurting anyone, do whatcha like. Privacy is king and I am the queen. In order for me to feel an urge to actually poke my uninvited (and even invited) nose into someone else’s home, I would have to be pretty damn sure something’s going on.

Which means that there could possible come a day when I may even see children playing in one of those rickety, should-be-condemned-campers and although for a second I’ll remember the Jaycee Dugard story, I’ll quickly push that away and instead assume the kids are just playing. Because that’s rational, right? Thinking kidnapped kids are being held hostage, not so much. That’s just plain old nuts.

I contemplate these things because it applies to child abuse as well. Kids are abused and neglected daily and it’s very seldom, unless it’s especially violent and noticeable, that anyone actually does anything. Because of where I work, I hear stories like this all the time. I dwell on them. I imagine and feel the pain and rage as if it happened to my daughter. I sometimes would rather not even know and consciously choose not to read about, discuss or listen to it. I know and I see the people that didn’t speak or take action or prevent child abuse. Frequently.

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Child abuse is only prevented if we accept our instincts. If we go with the “hunch” and take the chance that yeah, we may sound like a lunatic if we’re wrong, but what about if we’re right? And if we’re right and we didn’t do anything…?

I read this blog post by Kelly Diels, a stunning writer that I have just recently stumbled upon. Intelligent she is. Passionate. In this post, she (like most of us) stood at that line like it was a cliff over an ocean. Her hunch, her instincts, her intuition…were all dead on and there’s no doubt in my mind that she deals with that internally. Often. We all would.

I’d rather be called crazy.

To prevent child abuse, you have to cross the line. Maybe even jump off the cliff. Hopefully, we’re wrong.

Hopefully, if we’re right, we can help someone.

Be nosy. Be crazy. I think, this is how we might prevent.