There are many forms of child abuse and neglect. Abuse is defined as any action causing emotional, mental, sexual or physical harm to a child. Due to the drastic increase of reported child abuse cases throughout the United States, many agencies charged with protecting children are overloaded and struggling in their efforts to protect children from their abuser(s). Statistics show that three-million child abuse reports are made each year and only twenty-eight percent are investigated.
Research shows that one-third of girls and one-sixth of boys are sexually abused before the age of seventeen. Eight out of ten sexual abusers are someone in the family or someone the child knows; eighty percent of perpetrators are parents. The impact on the survivors of child abuse is life changing and can continue to have an affect long after the abuse has stopped. Prison inmates were questioned and results showed eighty-four percent of the inmates were abused as children.
In order to assist in the efforts of protecting children, a non-profit organization “Dreamcatchers” has been set up to encourage community involvement. Their goal is to educate communities, drastically decrease child abuse cases, and assist children coping with the aftermath of their abuse. With your support these goals can be achieved.
The founder of “Dreamcatchers”, Susan Potter, started the non-profit organization and developed the website dreamcatchersforabusedchildren.com . Susan’s driving force is her daughter who at five years old was molested. She stated that she felt angry, sad, and guilty because she hadn’t noticed any signs. Susan was even more traumatized upon finding out that her daughter’s molestation had been occurring since she was two years old and that the perpetrator was her step-father.
Neglect is by far the most common form of child abuse; which is seventy-eight percent of all cases. Every ten seconds an innocent child is abused, molested or killed. Child abuse facts show six children are dying every day in the United States alone from child abuse. “Dreamcatchers” strives to prevent children from going through any suffering. The website dreamcatchersforabusedchildren.com offers many resources to help people become more educated about child abuse. The different types of child abuse are physical abuse, emotional abuse, neglect, and sexual abuse. Physical abuse is any intentional hitting, slapping, or causing any physical harm to another. Emotional abuse is making another feel inferior by calling names, belittling them, teasing or expecting too much of another. Neglect is when one is not properly taking care of another’s needs such as fitted and clean clothing, providing food, and keeping up on hygiene. Sexual abuse is when forcing another to have sexual intercourse or to perform sexual favors without permission from the other. It is also a forceful and illegal act. The site lists different approaches on how to talk to children about what is right and what is wrong. “Dreamcatchers mission is to educate the public on all aspects of child abuse such as symptoms, intervention, prevention, statistics, reporting, and helping victims locate proper resources