A PROGRAM to rebuild relationships between mothers and their children aims to stop young victims of domestic violence from becoming perpetrators.
In an old sandstone building on the outskirts of Sydney, six children are given pots of paint and asked to create a picture that represents their feelings.
This is no ordinary craft lesson. These children are all here because in their short lives they have seen, heard, and felt too much. As they set to work with their paints, some use dark colours to draw frightening monsters. Others have hope: colourful lovehearts and flowers. All are about domestic violence and how it has affected their lives. ?It helps children understand what has happened and find a non-violent way of relating that,? says Melina Isgro-Rarp, convener of the Kids Create Tomorrow program run by the Benevolent Society.
When we think of domestic violence, we often think of women who suffer at the brutal hands of their partners. But increasingly children ? as witnesses and victims ? are being deeply and detrimentally affected. ?What they learn at a young age not only damages them, it has implications for our society. They learn violence is acceptable,? says Isgro-Rarp. The main aim of her program is to repair the mother-child relationship after they leave a violent home. ?We try to help children and mothers communicate about what happened and restore the mother-child relationship. Often the mother has had her parenting undermined; she has been the subject of humiliation and ridicule in front of her children.?
Take the case of 11-year-old Jake, whose real name cannot be used for legal reasons. In April his step-father badly beat him with a wooden spoon and then locked him in a pet cage in the back yard. ?My daughter came in and screamed, ?Mummy, mummy, Bob put Jake in the cage?,? says Jake?s 35-year-old mother. Jake is now in foster care after bruises on his legs were reported by his school teachers.
Jake?s step-father has been charged with assault. His mother has left the abuser, who was violent to her as well. But this wasn?t the family?s first encounter with a violent man. Jake?s biological father used to beat his mother. She left him 10 years ago when Jake was a baby. When he was just two, Jake?s arm was broken during a court-order access visit with his father. ?It was his turn to have the children and when I picked them up I could see Jake?s arm was broken and he hadn?t even been taken to the hospital.?
Isgro-Rarp says many children end up blaming their mother for their broken family and damaged lives.
?Children are often angry at their mum; you know: Why did she let it happen?? Isgro-Rarp says.
That was the experience of June ? not her real name ? when she left the father of her three children after 16 years of abuse. ?The children witnessed instability, punching of walls, a lot of intimidation, my parenting was undermined and he put me down in front of the children. There is trauma there, they don?t know how to deal with it, they have to blame someone,? says June, 45.
Her eight-year-old son was especially angry at her. Enrolling in the Kids Create Tomorrow program has made an enormous difference to his behaviour and attitude, June says.
?He found he wasn?t the only kid and that it wasn?t my fault and a few weeks in, he just felt he was heard. I learned he was in a lot of pain.?
Domestic violence is so prevalent police across NSW attend up to 330 callouts a day. Children are often witnesses and in up to 70 per cent of cases, they are victims.
The effects on the child are only just starting to be understood. Child developmental psychiatrist Professor Louise Newman says it can often be the reason behind a raft of problems society struggles to deal with: homelessness, drug addiction, alcohol abuse, aggression and violence. Look behind the rise of shocking street violence, unprovoked king hits and stabbings and often violence is in the perpetrator?s background.
?You can pretty much predict in the majority of these violent acts that the young people come from disturbing backgrounds,? Professor Newman says.
?Children, especially very young children, are learning how to manage difficult feelings and aggressive impulses and children exposed to ongoing conflict and abuse of power develop distorted models of how relationships work,? she says.
It can also damage brain development. ?Little children under four, if they are witnessing attacks on their primary care giver, often the mother, it is as if they are being attacked themselves, they are as damaged as if it was an attack on themselves. It?s a high stress situation, it affects the steroid cortisol and high levels of cortisol can impact on brain development,? Newman says.
Dr Bruce Perry from the US-based Child Trauma Academy told Agenda that children who witness domestic violence from a young age often develop post-traumatic stress disorder. ?It?s the fight or flight response, they are over-reactive, have attention problems and behavioural issues ? that or they will withdraw, dissociate and tune out,? he says.
Disturbingly, these children with PTSD will invariably be misdiagnosed as having attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, or ADHD, because the symptoms are similar in a child.
?These kids get drugged with Ritalin,? Dr Perry says.
Assistant Commissioner Mark Murdoch is the police spokesperson on domestic violence.
He?s been in the force for more than 30 years and laments that children being violent at home is the fastest growing part of the domestic violence problem.
Kids aged between 10 and 17 now represent about eight per cent of all domestic violence assaults ? that?s kids hitting parents and siblings ? a 25 per cent increase in the past five years.
Alcohol and even violent video games have been central to the debate over what triggers young people to be violent, but Murdoch says violence is often learned at home. ?That?s the logical assumption to make, that kids are witnessing this stuff thinking this is the way people conduct themselves in relationships,? Murdoch says.
?I?m dealing with a woman at the moment who has been a long-term victim of domestic violence. She has four kids, a girl aged 12 and three boys aged nine, six and five, and these kids were part of the violence.
?Whilst the perpetrator focused the violence on her, the kids would scream and cry and then he would threaten them with a machete, hitting the bottom of their beds with the machete.
?He?s been charged but these kids have behavioural issues already. The school is calling every day with trouble and I?d put my house on it the kids will end up as perpetrators of domestic violence because they have seen how dad has treated mum.?
Father Chris Riley runs Youth Off The Street, a charitable outfit that tries to give homeless kids a second shot. He estimates between 80 and 90 per cent of his troubled kids have fled abusive homes.
?One of our current girls ran away from home at 15 because her mother allowed her to be beaten up by successive partners,? Riley says.
?She hates her mother. The other tragic outcome for these girls is they get into inappropriate relationships, they go from refuge to refuge and end up in inappropriate relationships and now this girl is pregnant.?
Prevention is the ideal, yet often elusive solution. But for the children who have endured too much too soon, programs like Kids Create Tomorrow help to patch up the damage in a safe environment.
At the painting session in Campbelltown, 10-year-old Brody, not his real name, has drawn two very different pictures. The first is a monster. ?This is my anger monster,? he says.
?He is a very evil monster and I can control him. He brings anger to me and my family.?
The other picture represents Brody?s hopes for the future.
?This is my peace monster, he wants to come out . He will bring peace to me and the whole world.?
http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/national/the-children-who-know-too-much/story-fndo317g-1226458812959
Source: http://socato.org/?p=13006
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