Brier says that sports coaches can use their authority to groom and abuse young people
All names and identifying details have been changed.
Participants have given us permission to share their experiences.
Brier was groomed and sexually abused by a gymnastics coach.
She found it impossible to say no to him because of the respected position he held.
Gymnastics was a big part of Brier’s family life when she was growing up.
When she was in her early teens, she joined a new club and met a coach called Dave. He became involved with her family, taking them to his club. From here, he began to take Brier out alone, sometimes shopping or to the theatre. He was married with a child and he sometimes arranged for her to babysit.
Brier says that her mum ‘was won over by him … she was very naive … we were brought up to be nice and polite to people’.
Gradually Dave started touching and kissing Brier in a sexual way. One day after he had done this she went home and burst into tears. She told her mum what had happened but then begged her mum not to say anything about it, and her mum agreed.
Dave arranged to give Brier one-to-one coaching and this gave him more opportunities to sexually abuse her. She remembers one occasion when he was touching her in the changing room and someone walked in. ‘He jumped back, and I realised it wasn’t right’ she says, but she adds ‘Because he was my coach, I couldn’t say no’.
She adds that he was sometimes verbally abusive to her about her body, calling her ‘flabby’.
Brier has a vivid memory of the first time that Dave raped her. She remembers realising she wasn’t a virgin any more. The next day at training she was crying and an older girl took her somewhere to talk. She says the coach came ‘storming in, angry ... I know he was terrified I’d said something’.
Dave raped Brier several times and forced her to give him oral sex. At one stage she had cystitis and her mother made a joke about it being a ‘honeymoon disease’. Brier was embarrassed at this reference to sex and she didn’t mention it again.
She remembers crying at home and telling herself that she would say no next time. She adds ‘I felt it was my fault for letting it happen’.
The abuse continued for about two years until one day Brier managed to say no to Dave and he stopped. She says this was very important and empowering for her.
She got married before she was 20, and divorced a few years later. She has suffered with an eating disorder and says that she cries very easily and does not deal well with any stress.
Brier says that adults should be very mindful of the way they react to disclosures by children because the wrong reaction can make a child ‘clam up’. She says ‘I remember not wanting to say anything because of my mum’s reaction’.
She warns that parents can be lulled into a feeling of security with people who have authority, and that children need to know what is right and wrong and made to feel that they can speak out if necessary. She says that the relationship between children and sports coaches means you are programmed to do what they say. ‘If I didn’t do what I was told it wouldn’t have worked.’
Brier married again. She has talked to her husband about the abuse, and is beginning to speak about it with some friends. ‘It is more healthy to talk’ she says.