The Rational Basis® of Happiness Podcast

Transcript

The Selfish Path to Romance. Download chapter one for free at DrKenner.com, and @amazon.com
Lisa, you're having problems with your grandkids or you're worried about them.
Yes, tell me, yeah.

I believe that they are in an abusive situation where their father and stepmother are constantly arguing and fighting and where I know the law enforcement has been involved before.
Okay, so when you say abusive, what are your facts? What do you know?

Just, I mean, just constantly screaming, yelling, where, and then maybe the stepmother going out and, you know, beating on the cars and the windows and hitting her head up against the cars. And, you know, I'm not for sure if they are beating on the children or not.
So it's not like?how old are the kids?

Eight and five.
Eight and five. And is it your son? Is that the dad?

No.
Oh, how are they related to you?

My daughter.
Oh, your daughter. Okay. And does your daughter still have contact with them?

Yes, she does. They still, you know, they split custody. Yeah, they alternate weeks of having them.
Okay. And you know, she's also concerned about, you know, can she just, you know, take the kids, you know, and let him know that, you know, until he improves their home situation.

So she needs to be able to build a case, though. And partly, if the kids are eight and five, the eight-year-old can certainly talk if he feels comfortable talking. And that's really difficult. Are the two kids close to you?

Yeah, they're very close with us. They've also been warned by their father not to say anything to anybody about what's going on.
How do you know that?

They have said so.
Okay, so they are starting to talk. I see Dad?so Dad's afraid of losing custody then.

Well, I think, you know, that he may know that, you know, that could be a possibility, yeah. I just don't think the situation there is? it is affecting them. It's affecting them in school.
What's happening in school?

Well, they're being very disruptive in school, which they weren't before. And they also are having nightmares at night and not being able to sleep. Yeah, one has even woke up in the middle of the night. You know, they did say this?that he woke up in the middle of the night, put his sweatshirt on, put it over his head, and then went and laid on the couch and slept for a while because he heard them fighting, or because he was afraid for himself, or?

See, I'm trying to figure it here. Let me tell you what happens in abuse. Do you think it's physical abuse, not sexual? It's just physical?

Yeah.
I do not believe it's sexual. No.

Okay. With either type of abuse, usually the parent starts escalating. You know, they might start calling names, and then they start hitting, or threatening first, and then it moves into hitting. And then they usually hit on parts of the body that are covered, so it doesn't show in school?the clothes cover those parts. And so if they're, you know, at your house, if you see any bruises that are unexplained, or if they keep saying, ?Well, I keep falling down the stairs, I'm clumsy,? they may be covering up some abuse.

So you want to be able to, number one, just open your eyes and see what's going on. Once the abuse happens?the hitting or the screaming, the yelling?of course, if we're talking about physical abuse, then the parents or the abuser, the perpetrator, has to get their children?

Hey, I gotta interrupt this, because we've got to pay some bills. Thirty seconds, that's it. A very quick ad, and then Ellen will be back.

Romance.
I wish I knew more about what girls want from a relationship.
Well, I wish I knew more about what I want.
Where's that ad I saw? Here it is?The Selfish Path to Romance, a serious romance guidebook.
Download chapter one for free at SelfishRomance.com and buy it at Amazon.com. Huh? The Selfish Path to Romance? that is interesting.

Then the parents or the abuser, the perpetrator, has to get the children not to speak, not to talk about it. And so what types of methods would you use to get a kid to shut up? What means would you use?

They either use bribes??Oh, you're my? we have a secret. We don't have to tell this to anyone else. I'll buy you that toy you've wanted,? right? Or they use threats??You say a word to anyone?? and then they pick one of the kid's values: ?I'll take away your bike,? or ?You're not going to have the dog anymore in the house,? you know, they threaten, or ?You'll never get to see your mother again.?

And so the threats and the bribes are two very common ways that perpetrators try to shut the kids up.

Then the kids may disclose, meaning that's the next stage after the abuse, then the secrecy, then the next stage is disclosure. They might tell a friend who tells the parent, who tells the school?you know, the teachers, the counselors?or they may tell a grandparent such as yourself. Or they may not spill the beans, but someone may walk in and see the hitting going on and report it.

So sometimes it's within the kid's control when they report something. Sometimes it's not within their control. Sometimes they're ready to talk; sometimes they're not ready to talk. And you want to make them increasingly more comfortable to talk.

If they're with the parents, there is a real threat. If you see bruises, you can bring them to a doctor in an emergency room and just have a doctor look at the bruises, and you need to get some documentation. But if you suspect it, I would encourage them to talk.

There is a little book Some Secrets Are for Sharing. I don't know the author's name, but you could Google it. It's just a little kids? picture book, and it's about a little boy who is afraid to speak up and say that his mom's been hitting him. But he tells his coach accidentally, and then he feels very guilty, and then he goes into counseling, and his mother calls him a liar?of course, she never hit him. But then everything comes out, and they make it very comfortable for the boy to talk, as comfortable as it can be. And the mother does have to go to therapy and get some help.

So that encourages kids to speak up, because it's a little picture book that gives them permission. Some secrets are good secrets?you help them know the difference between good secrets (a surprise party, or a gift that you got someone for the holidays?don?t tell them, ?It?s just what they wanted!?). And some secrets are not good secrets, and they have every right to speak up to a trusting adult. And you might be that trusting adult.

You want to find out what the threats are, though, because if they feel like something really bad is going to happen, or they feel really guilty, you need to try to let them know that you'll be there to protect them, assuming you can. And then you can call?
The minute you have evidence of any abuse you can call Child Protective Agencies, or you can call a lawyer and get some help.

So really, before you can build a case, you really can't?there's really nothing you can do.

You can work like the dickens to help the kids feel comfortable with you and let them tell the story. You don't want to go in there like a lawyer: ?Okay, have they hit you on this? Have they done this? Have they done this?? It's more like you say, ?So tell me something good that happened to you today. And if you could erase one thing, what's something that happened today that you didn't like, that made you feel real anxious??

Or they might see a story of someone being hit?it might even be a cartoon?and then you start? ?Has that ever happened to you? Have you ever been in that situation? And how would you handle it?? You want to help them open up and talk.

Sometimes in play therapy, kids will act out the scenes that they see at home?the parents fighting and the hitting.

Listen, thank you so much for your call.

For more Dr. Kenner podcasts, go to DrKenner.com and please listen to this ad.

Here?s an excerpt from The Selfish Path to Romance, the serious romance guidebook by clinical psychologist Dr. Ellen Kenner:

One major destroyer of romance?and, in fact, of all relationships?is the threatening or initiating of physical force. Devon's relationship with Lydia is an example. He would bark orders at her, criticize her relentlessly, and slap her around whenever she talked back. If she tried to call a friend or her parents, he would yank the phone away from her. He did not let her spend money without his permission.

She felt sick and trapped and often fantasized about escaping to a safe place. Before the marriage, Devon had seemed like a confident, take-charge guy, but she had not realized until too late what ?take charge? meant to him. He was a control freak.

Lydia should not just have fantasized about running away. She should have walked out.

You can download chapter one for free by going to DrKenner.com, and you can buy the book at Amazon.com.