This a true and honest account of a series of sexual abuses performed over a period of six weeks.  It analyses the methods, the affects and the social construction of the circumstance and how this could have been averted and handled differently.

Alice was an 8-year-old girl.  Brought up by her parents, she was essentially an only child as her half brother was 10 years older and was living independently.  Alice always seemed to be a bit of a loner and she found it difficult to maintain friendships.  Her teachers often reported dreamy behaviour, her lack of concentration and a slow response to learning.  Alice was unable to read, write and numerate effectively.  This situation was in the process of being addressed, as a placement was made available within a small group of six to help accelerate learning.

The family home was some two miles from the school and Alice used to make the track to school and home most days.  She liked to walk alone as she enjoyed the objects, people and things she saw on the way.  Everyday was like an adventure to her, whatever the weather brought.  She would sometimes play on the swings or down the dell whilst returning home. 

Alice always had a sense of outcast.  She wanted to make friends and found it easy to initiate this but was not good at this over a period of time.  She would be teased much of the time – she was overweight and smelly.  Her father would say that she needed to stop being irritating and aggravating.  If she did this, she may have been more amenable to others.  Alice never really used toilet tissue to clean herself and only had a bath once a week.  It was no wonder that this may have got in the way of her relationships.  She would often talk and attempt to reason with herself,  “Why does nobody like me?  What can I do to make people like me?”  She found people fascinating and would observe in her dream-like state. 

Her family was not religious in any way.  Alice, however, was always very enquiring and felt she had a relationship with some higher entity.  She attended church on her own initiative.  Alice would often tell others of their problems in their lives.  She could never have possibly have known.  She didn’t know what she was saying and didn’t realise that it might actually have a bearing on things.  She was one of those people that used to ‘put her foot in it’, without realising it.  This made her feel isolated.

One day a nice pre-retirement aged man started to talk to her.  It was a lovely day and she liked the attention.  He lived on a council estate situated on the route home from school.  It was nice to chat, she thought.  The next day, he turned up again and they chatted some more.  This happened over a period of a week.  He was very nice to her.  He bought her ice cream and pointed out some lovely flowers in the bushes.  He seemed a nice man.  Some of the other children went to his flat.  Alice came along.  They all giggled.  It was strange as none of the other children returned to the flat, but the man approached Alice and she went back on her own on proceeding days.  She did some washing up for him and he gave her piggybacks.  One day his finger slipped in her knickers during this activity.  Alice thought it was an accident and took no notice but it happened again and again.  She thought it was a small price to pay for a friend and took no notice.  One day he showed her some pornographic magazines – she laughed it off.  He threw her on the bed and satisfied himself on her.  He walked her home.  He tried to have sex with her, over the period of time but she rolled away.

He used to walk her home sometimes. Her Aunt, who was staying at the family home, asked her who the man way. Alice just said he was a friend and nothing more was said.

Alice was acting very strangely at school. She stripped off under some trees and acted age inappropriately – an 8 year old acting like 18. She was behaving badly and rudely to the teachers and started touching the boys. At parents evening the teacher told her parents that there was something not quite right with their daughter but he couldn’t say what.

It was during a one to one session at reading that the teaching assistant asked what Alice was doing at the man’s flat – she lived opposite. She replied ,"By playing", but the teacher would not let the issue go. She pressurised Alice into telling her everything and said if she told her that I would not need to worry. She told her everything and cried. Alice was scared.

After the confession, Alice was made to repeat the story to the headmaster - then to her parents. “Are you sure you aren’t making up stories, Alice?” Her father asked her. She was very distressed. She shook her head. It was then to the Police station. “Has he been up to his old tricks, again?” was the response. Apparently, that was why the other children had stopped going to the flat – everyone else knew about this man, but Alice.

Alice was beside herself with distress when the police Doctor gave her an internal examination and it was difficult giving a statement. The man was arrested.

All the school seemed to know of what happened to Alice. She got bullied and teased. Many children said that she must have deserved it and led the man on. This is because the man was reported in the local newspapers – somehow everyone seemed to know who the abused child was.

After six months, the man was tried at court. He admitted his guilt. As a result he got 1 years probation and community service.

Alice suffered much from this experience. All she really wanted was for someone to say that what the man did was wrong and not to go near him and she would have stayed away. Instead the system abused her far more than the incident itself. She knew there was something not quite right with what the man was doing but thought that that was what happened, as a girl got older. Education and counselling would have been more appropriate to her needs, rather than suffer the indignation of explaining, reliving the experience, examination and bullying, It is therefore that Alice felt that the system abused her more than the abuse itself.

This work is covered under Creative Commons License

More stories about abuse?  Check this one out: The Hunted Fox – A School Bullying Story

•  The Fox Hunter – A Story Where the Victim of Bullying Becomes Survivor

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