Author: amandaguthorn

I had occasion to visit one of my former students while I was attending a professional conference on Cape Cod this week. Melanie Sachs, KSC class of 2013, saw my Facebook check-in and we were able to connect for coffee and a tour of the Children’s Cove Child Advocacy Center in Barnstable.

Melanie was in my Case Studies in Violence class in the 2013 Spring Semester. Her semester project was on Erin’s Law and the development of child advocacy centers, two topics about which she is passionate. Erin’s Law, named after Erin Merryn, a friend of Mel’s and a child sex abuse survivor, requires public schools, pre-K through 12) to provide age appropriate, prevention-centered child sexual abuse education to children, and educates teachers and parents about what to look for and what to do.  It has now passed in 26 states (yay NH!) and pending in 17 others.  About Erin’s Law

Child advocacy centers (CAC) provide services and support to child victims of sexual abuse and children who have witnessed domestic violence.  The CAC model focuses on the needs of the children and their families (Mel is a family advocate). Interviews take place at the centers which have a homelike feel with lots of soft colors and toys, as opposed to police stations which can be scary and sometimes make the child feel that they are in trouble. The Children’s Cove CAC has 2 comfortable and quiet living rooms (waiting areas), one on the main floor where we entered, the other on the ground floor where the families enter. Children’s handprints decorate the walls in the stairwell that leads from the main floor to the ground floor to the interview areas. The handprints belong to the children who have come through this center and the walls are full. Yes, that many kids.

In each interview room there are 2 big comfy chairs, a table, a box of tissues and the obligatory video and audio equipment. One wall is a two way mirror that hides those behind it; those waiting to hear the disclosures of these little people who have endured things we should not even have to imagine.

We then moved up to the third floor as Mel introduced me to the staff members we encountered along the way. In (mental health health coordinator) Cherie’s office there is a locked door that leads into the examination room. CC employs a sexual assault nurse examiner (SANE) to avoid the trauma of the ER (unless an emergency of course) and this is her workspace. Cherie unlocked the door exposing a lovely soft yellow-green room with bright pictures, toys and a gyn exam table about 1/2 the size of one that would be used for an adult. This took my breath away. I experienced a profound sense of sadness that we needed to have a tiny little exam table for these tiny little children who have been preyed upon by adults with no concern for anything but their own hideous urges. The green frog socks over the stirrups and the stuffed frogs on the table did little to camouflage what happens there.

I am not feint of heart and have seen my share of the terrible things that happen in life, but this room, this table, made the horror of child sexual abuse real to me in a way I had not experienced before.

One in 4 girls and one in 6 boys will be sexually abused before their 18th birthday. I encourage you to check out the awareness campaign at the link below. We can keep our children safe together.

Children’s Cove Awareness Campaign

#childrensadvocacycenters #children #childsexualabuse #keepthemsafe #cacs

In about 3 hours, we will flip the calendar to June 14th.

The date is important for 2 reasons: it’s Flag Day, first declared so by President Woodrow Wilson in 1916. But more important, it is the birthday of one of the kindest, most forgiving, loving and understanding people I have ever met; my sister Nancy Guthorn Harrington.

Growing up she was a little bossy, probably just a little resentful of having to take care of her younger siblings but when push came to shove, she was Mama Bear and she still is. Growing up in a “survival of the fittest” environment (with 7 siblings) being tough was our armor. We all had it and we still do. With Nancy, you would never see it and that’s what made it so powerful.

As the siblings grew older and apart, some by miles and some years, distance and time mellowed us. Careers, lives, relationships, birth, death, marriage, illness, sadness, kids, no kids, brought us together in different ways and for the most part, at different times. We have been, at best, asynchronous in the things that have shaped our lives.We can recite the dates of birth, deaths, weddings and divorces, the exact legally documented moments of the events that changed our lives but it is so much harder to name those moments when someone helped us reframe them, helped us make sense of them, and put them into context without judgment. And that is where Nancy mastered the art of humanity.

There is no blame or guilt, we’ve all got that in spades. There is love, there is listening, there is forgiveness, there is my sister.

I spend an interminable amount of time in meetings, both at work and with volunteer organizations. Interminable – really. While some work is done, for the most part they are a way to exchange information that could have been communicated as effectively by other means. Meetings with a focus, an agenda, a good facilitator, and people who are upbeat and engaging are great. They’re productive and you walk away feeling that you’ve accomplished something.

Then, there are the other meetings. Oh my, so many other meetings.The meetings we have because they are on the calendar even if we have nothing to discuss. The meetings where the facilitator should have an agenda because there is important work to be done but doesn’t. To compensate, or perhaps in an attempt to hoodwink the attendees, the facilitator goes into a confusing stream of consciousness diatribe as the rest of us look on with the expression of a confused miniature schnauzer trying to figure out why mommy is crying. The comments have a distinct lack of clarity, also known as “what the hell was that about?”.

I’m also a fan of meetings that end before the scheduled time. Business is done, agenda covered: done and done and on to the rest of your day. But just like in the mind numbing Intro to Economics class that ended at 5 pm on Friday freshman year, there is that guy/woman. Yes, the one who has to ask just one more question that seems to make absolutely no sense and has no relevance to the class, or well, anything. “We’re missing Happy Hour Dude – move along” (says the professor). Once again, a distinct lack of clarity.

And let’s not forget the glorious memo/email from the “mother ship”. That which holds our fates in its hands. There is mention of budgets and policies and positions and contracts and value added and transparency and choices and benefits and Fair Wages and Standards changes and…oh BINGO! (My friends who are familiar with meeting Bingo will appreciate that.) Amidst the numerous flowery paragraphs and academic speak, I actually have no f’ing clue what they said. And I’m a pretty smart cookie. A distinct lack of clarity.

I know we sometimes have to sugar coat things to make them more digestible but please, at some point, we just need to say what we need to say. Give me clarity or….give me a meeting. No, really, give me clarity.

I love fortune cookies. I actually like the way they taste and sometimes, I even like the fortune. These are the ones I save. They might be tucked into a jacket or a section of my wallet or in my pants pocket. If I’m home, one might sit on the kitchen table for a while or next to the chair where I eat dinner while watching TV, an unfortunate pairing of two bad habits. At my office, one is thrown in a desk drawer or taped to my computer monitor. All places where I need reminders that life holds more for me if I’ll let it.

Yes, I know they’re fortune cookies and they are mass produced in the bazillions but I like to think that cookies, and their fortunes, sometimes find the person who needs them most. And I’m a purist: the fortune I get is the fortune I get. If I don’t like it, I don’t double dip. I won’t keep it but I don’t go looking for a better answer. It’s like asking a friend’s advice and when you disagree with it, you keep asking until you get an answer you like. It’s disrespectful to the cookie.

My most recent find was while dipping into my wallet for change (yes, I use cash, it’s part of my new spending diet, a post for another time). “If I bring forth what is inside me, what I bring forth will save me.” Hmmm, now I have to figure out what’s in here.

Let me take a look through the inventory. Right at the top is FOMO (fear of missing out which I’m sure you knew already), that won’t help. Regret, not helpful. Embarrassing moments from my entire life that I ruminate over so they’ll live on forever?  I don’t even know how I get out of bed everyday thinking about those. Pent up rage is looking for a little air time; thanks but no thanks. Wow, I have to go pretty deep in here; it’s like looking for one of those funky sea creatures that live in the deepest depths of the ocean cleverly disguised as a rock or a blob of….blob.

I found something! Let me pull this up and see what we have. There are two things actually and they seem to have grown together and they’re partially calcified. I do see a bit of color, a dim glow of blue on one of them and the faintest showing of red on the other – and it’s pulsating slowly like a heart. Oh that’s it! My heart and my hope have been hanging out in there so damn long they’ve grown together for protection.

Well, guess what? I am bringing you forth. You are my fortune and you’ve got your work cut out for you.