HEALTHY KIDS · NOVEMBER 2018
SEXUAL ASSAULT
IS EVERY PARENT'S
NIGHTMARE
HERE'S ONE THING
PARENTS CAN DO TO
PROTECT THEIR CHILDREN
I
t’s a scary world out there, parents.
I know you don't need me to tell you
this. You probably spend most of your
day worried about how your child will
navigate school, adolescence, and
eventually the real world.
With the prevalence of social media and the
24-hour news cycle, we now know more than
ever about the evil in the world. This does
not help with our parental anxiety.
In recent months, it seems that every day
a new case of sexual assault breaks on the
news. On one hand, it is good that women
are able to tell their stories, find solidarity
and, hopefully, closure after enduring such a
tragic event. But I know seeing these cases
on the news day after day does not do much
to ease your fears about sending your child
into the world. It simply adds to the long list
of things that you worry about.
And for parents of daughters, this is espe-
cially troubling. Ninety-one percent of sexual
assault victims are female. But I am not writing
this to scare you. I actually think that as a par-
ent you can have hope in such scary times.
I say this often because I believe it is
true: Parents, you have more influence over
your child than anyone else. You have more
influence than social media and your child's
peers, teachers and coaches. This means when
it comes to seemingly uncontrollable events,
such as sexual assault, you have the power to
not only intervene but also to help prevent.
If we want to ensure our
daughters are safe and
protected from sexual assault,
we have to raise sons who
know what it means to respect
a woman and her body. And
moms, you are some of the
best ones to do this.
STRONG MOTHERS RAISE STRONG SONS
Sons learn so much from their mothers. Per-
haps the biggest lessons are these: wisdom
and responsibility. As women, we have an
intuition that tells us what is right for our
kids. It's built into us. That's wisdom. As the
stabilizing force in our families—the ones
who have given birth to and fed our children
from birth—we also have an innate sense of
responsibility. Because of this, our sons often
learn these two important qualities from us.
In a culture where being manly trumps being
wise, and improving one's macho status
matters more than being responsible, we
mothers know that we have our work cut out
for us when teaching the lessons of wisdom
and responsibility to our sons. This is why it
is crucial that we do this. Men who are wise
and responsible value all human life, male
and female. Men who are wise and respon-
sible put others first. Men who are wise and
responsible see others as whole humans
beings—body, soul, and spirit—not just a
physical body.
So how do we instill wisdom and responsibil-
ity in our sons? We model it ourselves. We
trust our guts and intuitions, and we stand
firm in doing what we believe is best for our
kids as they are growing up. Then, when they
are older, we can challenge them to follow us
in our behavior. We do this by implementing
strong boundaries and by speaking up.
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