Dann says there should be ‘after-care’ for victims and survivors of abuse when they come forward
All names and identifying details have been changed.
Participants have given us permission to share their experiences.
Dann describes his family as dysfunctional. His dad drank heavily and was violent towards him.
He was sexually abused as a child by two adult males, who ran an ‘open house’ for several boys.
The men who abused Dann, Sam and Chris lived together and Dann says ‘they had everything’ – meaning video games and films. A few boys would go round to the house and they were allowed to drink and smoke.
Sam was a social worker. Dann remembers how shocked he was the first time Sam sexually abused him. But he says his dad was ‘fierce’ and a heavy drinker and Dann was sure that if he told his parents, his dad would cause a scene, or blame him, so he said nothing.
Dann was lonely at school and was bullied a lot. But Sam and Chris flattered him, telling him how intelligent he was. They took him out and sometimes he stayed overnight in their house.
By his late teens, Dann stopped going to the house. He was drinking, taking drugs and carrying knives.
As an adult, he was violent and addicted to drugs and alcohol. ‘I became a monster’ he says. He had a child when he was in his early 30s; this prompted him to re-evaluate his life and he went for therapy. After some time he realised it was not going to help him unless he told the truth about his experiences, but he felt too ashamed.
Then a chance encounter with one of the men who had abused him left Dann shocked and enraged, and he managed to tell his counsellor what had happened to him as a child.
Dann reported the abuse to the police and in the two years it took for the case to get to court, he managed to ‘get clean’ of drugs. He found it very difficult facing the abusers in court, but they were both given prison sentences.
At the end of the trial, he was told he could claim compensation, which he did, but is still waiting to receive a payment. He says ‘People think it’s about money, but it’s about putting a lid on it’.
Dann was diagnosed with complex PTSD and antisocial personality disorder. He feels guilty that he took so many years to report the abuse, and he worries that Sam may have abused many boys.
He has had difficulty working and has low self-confidence. He says all his relationships ‘have been awful’ and he tries not to get involved with anyone now. He feels he never had a childhood, but at the same time he wonders if his past means that he never really grew up.
Dann says he longs for routine and structure, to have good quality therapy and to be understood. ‘I need someone to say “This is the way you go now”’. He adds ‘The recovery is the important thing for me now … whatever happens, I won’t stop trying to find help’.