Personal experiences with molestation by family members are among the most terrible experiences one can imagine. The typical scenario is often the mother’s non-biological (but not always) SO repeatedly molesting her daughter.
When molestation is finally revealed, in many cases the mother’s response is almost always “I never knew”. Honestly when I hear this I’ve always wondered how the hell this could even be possible unless the mother is a drunk or deaf. Houses are not soundproof, nor are stairs, or bedroom doors, or especially beds. When I was a kid I could easily place most of my families presence in the house with a fair degree of accuracy just by the aforesaid sounds and similar cues.
That a man could get up, leave his wife’s bedroom, enter his daughter’s bedroom and proceed to fondle her or worse, and then return to his bedroom all with the wife obvilious often over years of time sort of beggars my imagination.
How for real is the “I never knew” statement in these scenarios?
Yes, it’s credible. First off, you’re picturing a very odd scenario. Second, you’d be surprised at what stuff is assumed to be innocent. I’ve seen a lot of stuff that I would think would be at least seen as awkward, but nobody bats an eye. Third, molester’s are typically very good at covering their tracks.
Man, I never thought that one paper I was going to write on the subject (and didn’t even actually do) would come up so much. I just wish I could remember the specifics a bit better, so I could give you more concrete examples.
I know my father never knew my maternal grandfather was a child molester. Mom’s obsession with covering it up extended to threatening me with kicking me out of the house if Dad ever found out; since I was used to seeing my parents in complete agreement over everything, the idea that “it’s Dad’s house too and he probably won’t agree to that” didn’t even cross my mind. Dad knew that sometimes we wouldn’t want to be anywhere near Grandpa, but not why, and since it was Mom’s family and she claimed to be handling it, he let her.
Every “incident” with Grandpa took place when Dad was not around; at the very least, he’d be out of the house and not expected for a couple of hours.
As for the case when it happens while the mother is asleep, there’s both heavy sleepers and trips to the bathroom. And the child won’t be making noise if (s)he thinks it’ll be worse.
I think one has to consider how much ‘he would never do that’ can get in the way of not noticing something. And the person is usually taking an active role in making up stories to cover any anomalies as well.
A milder version of this is with affairs where a person can suddenly realise that a huge web of lies was involved, it looks obvious once they know it was happening, but until then the person just trusted what they were told.
I bet in a lot of cases the parent did know or suspect but they were in denial out of fear, loathing, disbelief or whatever. How does one bring up the subject to their SO that they think inappropriate shit is going down with their kids? By freaking right the fuck out? That may be too scary, too dramatic, too upsetting for some to even think about. And to hold it together how do they distance themselves from the situation, turn tables on the child? Pretend they never knew it was happening? What about the kid, are there absolutely no clues she is giving off that something is severely complicating her life, for years and years? Uh Uh I’m not buying it.
I’ve known molested individuals who, despite being very distraught, lived normal lives. The only long term complications were trust issues – and even then they weren’t obvious as being related to abuse.
I have trust issues – big ones – and I’ve never been molested. Things that, once you know, are from molestation might seem obvious, but until you do they’re just a normal person who’s a bit off of average.
I’m observant, I can tell you with 95% or better accuracy where both of my dogs, and my dad, are in the house at any given time. My dad runs from room to room looking for me when i told him I’d be in the toilet 20 seconds earlier.
Some people just don’t pay as much attention as others.
I don’t have any direct experience with molestation, but I do have some first hand knowledge of not asking a question when the answer is too awful to contemplate, and convincing yourself that up is down. I don’t know that I could manage it if the safety of my child were at stake.
Some mothers drink, or take sleeping pills, too.
My post started out as if I had some answers, but really I don’t. Just more questions. If a molester has been dealing with inappropriate urges since before he* was married is it possible he would choose (whether consciously or not) a wife who wouldn’t challenge him or stand up to him? Or someone it was easy to manipulate?
*I assume there are also female molesters, but…
Both of these, in my experience (and by the way, I would say that the typical example isn’t ‘non-biological SO’, but close relation, be that a parent, uncle, grandfather or other).
All families have their quirks and ‘known behaviours’. Most of the time these are appropriate, but there is, after all, no such thing as ‘normal’. So the fact that a father, for instance, likes to take his daughter off to events on a weekend because they share a common interest, or doesn’t feel she needs to go to church with the mother and other siblings, goes pretty much unnoticed. After all, these things often grow up over time, rather than coming completely out of the blue, and therefore seem very natural. They do, in some cases though, have a sinister undertone.
In other words (again, in my experience and through talking to other people involved in such situations) the mother has no way of knowing - and no obvious reason to be suspicious. It wouldn’t be great if we all went around suspecting everyone, especially those closest to us, to have an ulterior motive for everything - but sometimes they do.
(edited to add): **gwendee **is spot on too I think, in that it might not be that molesters recognise they have urges prior to getting in relationships, but generally it would appear to be the case that the sociopathic mindset required to do such things would also mean taking a particularly dominant role in the relationship and/or only settling down with someone who can’t/won’t take issue with that approach.