La Piñon is a non-profit organization and a 501(c)(3) Registered Charity in the U.S. with a volunteer Board of Directors.
| Name | Title |
|---|---|
| Jodi-Rae Moore | Chairperson |
| Lily Caballero-Haines | Treasurer |
| Kathi Jackson | Secretary |
| Suzette Goodwin | Board Member |
| Danny Trujillo | Board Member |
| Gloria Salgado | Board Member |
| Ricardo Porras | Board Member |
| Louise Tracey-Hosa | Board Member |
| CaraLynn Banks | Board Member |
| Barb Baumann | Board Member |
| Sheri Jans | Board Member |
| Amanda Lopez Askin | Board Member |
Police, survivors debunk human trafficking kidnapping myths
www.mlive.com
January is national Human Trafficking Awareness Month.Dear Parent,
You have taught your child not to talk to strangers. When you put your kids in the car you buckle them up to keep them safe. When they ride their bike, you put a helmet on them to protect them from being injured. If they don’t know how to swim you put a life vest on so they do not drown. You have a smoke detector in your house to alert you if there is a fire. At night, you lock the doors and turn on your security cameras to keep your family safe. In a decade fewer then 350 children have been abducted by a stranger. Less than 2,000 children die every year in car accidents. On average 350 children die from drowning every year. Close to 500 children die every year in fires.
There is one thing many parents don't do to protect their kids. That is protecting your child from being a victim of sexual abuse. 1 in 4 girls and 1 in 6 boys will be sexually abused by the age of 18. Every year an estimated 300,000 kids are sexually abused in America by adults. That number is estimated at 1 million when you include peer on peer abuse and dating sexual assault. Over 90% of the time they are being abused by someone they know and not the stranger walking past them at the bus stop. Someone you trust with your kids. Which is often family members. If you want to protect your kids from abuse then you must sit down and talk to them about personal body safety. Helping them identify five safe adults they can talk to if someone sexually or physically abuses them. Teaching them the differences of safe and unsafe touch and safe and unsafe secrets. Tell them they will be believed if someone hurts you and this is not your fault. Explain to your child that you do not tell them this to scare them but to keep them safe.
At six-years-old I went to my first overnight. It was there I woke up to my best friend’s uncle who lived with her, sexually abusing me. I was told to keep it a secret. So I did. This man lived in my neighborhood. He would go on to sexually abuse me multiple more times and eventually rape me. I will be 35 next month and still can recall the shirt this man wore, the toys on the floor, the closet doors opened, the look of evil in his eyes, and the threats he told me after raping me. Threats that kept me from telling anyone. Instead I acted out in anger and even put my hand through a window. My abused ended just before I turned 9 because we moved.
Moving got me that much closer to my next abuser. This time at age 11 while spending the night with my grandparents I woke up in the middle of the night to my older teenaged cousin abusing me. This abuse continued until I was thirteen. I kept my secrets locked away in my diary that I turned into a published book called Stolen Innocence. It was in my diary I wrote about the abuse that happened often since he also lived in my neighborhood. My cousin threatened me that nobody would believe me, I would destroy our family, and it would be my fault. I believed the lies he told me so I stayed silent as he continued to lock me behind closed doors abusing me until I was 13. This was sometimes happening at large family gatherings with my parents and relatives in another part of the house. I broke my silence when my 11-year-old sister came to me with the same secret. My cousin was abusing her too.
I share this with you to wake up the parents who have not talked to their kids about personal body safety. You start having this conversation as young as the age of two. There are many children’s books that make this an easy conversation to have and resources on my website at erinslaw.org
I don’t want you to one day have the 17-year-old daughter with an eating disorder, the 19-year-old son with a drug addiction, the 22-year-old selling her body, or the 25-year-old that commits suicide because they spent years being abused and suffered in silence. Don’t be that parent that finds out too late. Have that conversation today. I have opened the door to shed light on the secrets that happened behind closed doors to save children across this world. Lastly I ask you to think twice before allowing your child to go to sleepovers. Is it worth the risk?
Help share my message with other parents. You may just help save a child today.
National Children's Alliance
Scary Mommy
Children's Advocacy Center of North and Northwest Cook County
Today's Parent
