How to Handle It When Your Child Tells Your Their Rape Story

For traditional parents, I imagine that the idea of their child being raped is a horrific nightmare, a possible reality that they do everything they can to prevent.

By the time our kids get to us, it is too late to prevent them from having been hurt, and the likelihood that they have been raped or molested isn't a possibility: it is a probability. As a foster parent, you will almost certainly have a child want to tell you about past abuse, physical or sexual, and there is a correct way to react.


1. Remain Calm- You are going to want to cry. You are going to want to vomit. You are going to want to get up in the middle of their story and go put the sonofabitch in a grave. And if they are already in a grave you are going to want to go spit on it.   You can't do any of that. I can't stress enough how important it is to remain calm. Hold your anger and anguish as a fireball in your gut and keep you face calm.

Several reasons for this: a lot of foster kids take on adult responsibility for themselves. If they think that their story is too much for you to handle, they won't tell you in order to protect you. Also, if you express anger even though you are directing all of that anger at their abuser, they will take it as directed at THEM. You have to think, they were always told to never tell, that no one would believe them, that it was their fault. They are so afraid that you will be mad at THEM. If they see your anger, it could scare them from sharing again.

2. Don't Ask Queastions, Just Listen:-Often you will be fostering a child and there will be an ongoing abuse investigation taking place. All you can do is listen and report what they say to DCF. If you ask questions or talk too much, you might guide a child (especially a younger child) into saying something they don't mean, or into giving you the answer they think you want to hear. Even innocent questions might lead them to say something that could hamper an investigation. Listen. Report. That is all you can do.

3. Tell Them It's Not Their Fault- No one has probably ever told them that what happened wasn't their fault. Abusers blame their victims. They tell their victims that they were bad, that this is how it is supposed to be, that the victim WANTED it to happen. Often family members will call them liars, or tell them to keep it a secret and then feel like they ALLOWED the abuse to continue. Tell them over and over "it's not your fault."

4. Stay Calm- Can't oversell this. Don't tell them that you are angry. Tell them you are sorry. Tell them that what happened to them was wrong, that it never should have happened, that they are safe in your home. Your child will need your comfort and love, not your anger.

5. Thank Them for Telling You- It takes an extraordinary amount of trust for a child to share what is often their darkest secret with you. Sometimes you are the first they have ever told. Often you will be the first "family" to believe them. It is so hard to hear, but you should accept it they way you would accept a gift. You are holding their highest level of trust in your hands. It is precious. Treat it as such.

6. Stay Calm- Last time I promise. I say this so many times because every instinct you have will to be anything but calm. Your instinct will be to protect and to gain justice. Often you can only protect going forward.

7. When They Tell You How They Deal With It, Don't Judge-  I have had a child tell me that they touch themselves at night because they are afraid "_____" will touch them there again. That child asked me if that was bad. My only question was if the child touched themselves in a way that hurt. Once they said no, I told them no. It is their body and they are allowed to touch anywhere they want. They need that.
Older children may act differently. They might cut themselves, be promiscuous, or engage in a variety of actions that we don't want them to. HELP is different than JUDGEMENT. Of course you will prevent them from cutting, of course you don't want them having random sex. But telling them they're bad, that what they are doing is horrible, only reinforces that feeling of guilt. Instead tell them how worthy they are, tell them their body is too precious to hurt. Tell them that you are going to walk the walk to recovery with them. HELP and REDIRECTION are different than JUDGEMENT.


If any of you have experience this, and have any other tips or strategies, please share. We all need all of the help we can get.