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Page 1 of 2 Most of the professional literature seems agree that 3-to-10% of the people who sexually abuse children are women. I think the professional community has a lot to learn. From my experience, in the survivor community on the net, I would guess that at least 20% of women survivors have primarily suffered sexual abuse by a woman, and the figure would be much higher if you counted secondary abuse.
There are a lot of other myths out there about sexual abuse by women. I hope the idea that women abusers are always coerced by men into abusing has pretty much disappeared. I have heard that female abusers are usually psychotic and that female abusers are usually not violent, and I doubt that a really good study would show either of those to be true. The bottom line is that society finds this idea very hard to accept, because if we accept that women can be abusers, then how can we ever feel safe that our children are safe?
I'm writing this page as a way of saying: we are not alone. Let me provide you with some links first to the resources I know of, and then I will give you some of my own thoughts. Please be careful; all this material may be triggering.
If you look at my book list you can find autobiographies by survivors who were abused by women. I have recently read three books that I found really useful:
- When You're Ready: A Woman's Healing from Childhood Physical and Sexual Abuse by her Mother (Rockville MD: Launch Press, 1987), by Kathy Evert and Inie Bijkerk, is just the kind of book I like--a story not of abuse (though there are enough details to make it real) but of the healing journey.
- The same author also has a new book out under her real name: Bobbie Rosencrans, The Last Secret: Daughters Sexually Abused by Mothers (Brandon, VT: Safer Society Press, 1997). This book reports the results of a questionnaire filled out by 93 women who were sexually abused by their mothers, and it has lots of vivid quotes from the women.
- I also recommend From Generation to Generation: Understanding Sexual Attraction to Children (Tiburon CA: The Printed Voice, 1994), by Anne Stirling Hastings. This book uses the model of sexual addiction to try to understand how to better heal abuse and abusers. Hastings argues that abuse by women is much more common than studies have so far shown (people refuse to recognize it because the shame is so overwhelming). She deals both with what I have called below primary and secondary abuse, and in particular makes the point that it can still be sexual abuse even if the abuser doesn't feel sexual stimulation..
Some other resources: The organization M.A.L.E. has a page for Male Survivors including an article by a survivor on Female Child Molesters/Offenders. The Invisible Boy, a substantial book about abuse of boys and male teenagers written by a Canadian psychologist, is available in its entirety on the web. It argues that female perpetrators are much more common than professionals have recognized and that female perpetrators are not necessarily highly emotionally disturbed. Michele Elliott edited a book on Female Sexual Abuse of Children (New York, London: Guilford Press, 1993). It includes a rather muddled section for professionals and also somewhat graphic descriptions of abuse by both male and female survivors. It did make me feel less alone, but I wish it was a better book. The Safer Society Foundation publishes books and provides information on child sex abuse prevention and treatment issues. They have a number of other books about abuse by females.
The following pages by survivors include autobiographies of abuse that involve female-female abuse.
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