Last week, I blogged about child-on-child abuse. It occurred to me that I have not yet covered sibling abuse directly on my blog, so I will rectify that today.
Sibling abuse is when a child abuses his or her sibling. The victim can be older, the same age (a twin), or younger, and the child abuse can be physical, sexual, and/or emotional. This form of child abuse is much more common than most people appreciate. In fact, three of my close off-line friends suffered from this form of abuse.
As with other types of child-on-child abuse, the victims of sibling abuse often feel invalidated because the abuser was a child (instead of an adult) and because the abuser was a sibling. In many cases, the parents had at least some knowledge of the abuse but dismissed it, minimized it, or flat out denied it.
I have heard many times that half of the long-term emotional damage of child abuse comes from the abuse itself, but the other half of the damage comes from the parents’ or guardians’ reactions to the abuse. If two children experience the same exact abuse, the one with a supportive family that got the child into therapy and sought justice will not experience the same amount of collateral emotional damage as experienced by the child whose parents knew and did nothing.
For sibling abuse to happen, the parents have to, at the very least, be somewhat detached from their children. If the parents are not part of the abuse, then they are clearly not supervising the children very well if one child is abusing the other. Even if the parents truly had no idea that that sibling abuse was happening, the victim is going to view the family dynamic as a conspiracy that threw him under the bus, and the victim has every reason to feel this way.
As I have shared before, it is not developmentally appropriate for young children to keep secrets. For a child to keep the parents in the dark about ongoing sibling abuse, there were, at best, dysfunctional dynamics going on in the family. Bottom line – It is a parent’s job to keep the child safe. If your sibling abused you and your parents did not intervene, then your parents failed you. Sibling abuse IS abuse, just as much as any other form of child abuse.
Photo credit: Lynda Bernhardt
Blooming Lotus 
I once read that a child that has experienced trauma is taken out of that traumatic environment and is in a nurturing environment will heal and rather quickly.
I use this model for us. The quickly does not happen as it is so hard as an adult to create a nurturing environment. That and I do not have any experience.
The trauma caused by children when the person who is experiencing the trauma is also a child does not lend itself to clear resolution. Calling what the child did abuse is blaming the child. Not calling it abuse sometimes seems not respectful to the one who experienced the trauma.
I find it helpful to know that what I experienced was traumatic, that it was wrong and never should have happened. I express my feeling about the experience and as best I can not worry about what I think about it. Then and only then can I get to that I am mostly sad that these things happen in this world in which I live.
I am learning so much from your words Faith. Thank you for all you do, and for taking so much care and consideration to include as many situations as possible. You amaze me~
Peace,
mia
My brother was one of my abusers and, you’re so right….there are a million doubts and excuses when your abuser is also a child. So many times, I’d mentally tried to absolve him of it which left the blame on me. My parents….well, my mom walked in on it happening, turned around, closed the door & walked away. After I told what happened, my father made me admit I was lying and apologize to my brother for making up such lies about him while my mom looked on silently and never said a word. My parents failed me indeed.
Thanks for posting this.
Sibling Child Abuse « Blooming Lotus…
I found your entry interesting do I’ve added a Trackback to it on my weblog :)…
I am now in the position of taking care of my aged mother who, at the time, did not believe my claims of abuse from brother (who was five years older). It wasn’t until my brother fessed up, so to speak, that my mother believed what had happened.
I had the crap beaten out of me from about 6 to 13. It wasn’t until I threatened to kill my brother if he touched me again that it stopped. (No idle threat – I was prepared to do so.) Although I am relatively open, very few people in my current life know about this part of my life.
Thanks for addressing on your blog.
Sibling abuse can be even more difficult to deal with when the offending sibling is emotionally and behaviorally unstable, combined with the parents’ lack of acknowledgment that actual abuse is occurring. I am involved with the family of an eleven year old boy who’s fifteen year old brother has abused him all of his life. Because his parents were in denial, to the extent of asking the abused son to forgive and overlook the behavior of the emotionally unstable sibling, there is no paper trail or official record of violence or abuse. Now that the abused child is eleven, he is speaking out to family about his experiences. However, due to the lack of paper trail, there are no authorities who will enforce any action to separate the children (at the younger siblings request) until there is documented extreme physical harm. Do we really need to expose this boy to further physical abuse before someone in an authoritative capacity will help??
Recent trips to local Sheriff’s and Police departments came up empty handed when we tried to file even as much as an informational report. “This is just sibling rivalry,” they said to the eleven year old’s teary-eyed dismay. The abusive sibling’s therapist had a private session with the younger boy who disclosed a lifetime of abuse and fear for his safety. As a Mandated abuse reporter by the State of California, the therapist has neglected to file a report, to date.
The local domestic abuse shelter says the abused boy lives in the wrong county.
Police and Sherriff’s offices won’t issue an emergency restraining order.
The young boy resides on an Air Force base and has asked base security for help and resources. None. If they don’t see signs of physical harm, then none occurred.
See no evil; hear no evil.