Paddy is afraid that people might judge him if they knew he had been sexually abused as a child
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After his father died in an accident, Paddy was sent to live in a children’s home.
A male member of staff groomed and sexually abused him. He believes he was vulnerable to this man’s attention because he had no father.
The children’s home was run by a couple and Paddy remembers that some of the female staff were ‘lovely’.
The home also employed an odd job man called Denis, who was the leader of the local Boys’ Brigade. Paddy says the children were ‘pushed’ to join the Boys’ Brigade, so he did.
He can’t remember how it started, but Denis struck up a friendship with him. He wonders if he bonded with Denis because he had lost his dad. Paddy would help Denis with odd jobs, and Denis started taking him out – sometimes to buy him things, which Paddy appreciated.
Denis began taking Paddy to stay at his home, where he lived with his mother. Paddy would sleep in Denis’s room and he says he ‘didn’t think anything of this’, because he was used to sharing a room in the children’s home. However, one night he woke up to find Denis ‘doing sexual things’ to him.
He didn’t know what to do, and because he felt his mother was trying to do the best for him, he never told anyone. After this episode of abuse, Denis ‘carried on as normal’, until he took some of the boys on holiday. Paddy says he wanted to go, and as he knew other boys would be there, he thought ‘it would be ok’.
However, he found himself having to share a room again with Denis, and the sexual abuse continued during the holiday.
When Paddy was older, he was sent to a boarding school in a different town. He says everything was ‘fine’ there, although academically he didn’t do well. He was bullied and told he was ‘thick’ by the teachers. He left school with no qualifications.
After his mother and one of his brothers died, Paddy says he went through ‘a bad patch’ which brought back memories of being abused. He had a nervous breakdown and says ‘I lost a year of my life’. He relates that he was very troubled with thoughts of other children who may have been abused.
Some years later, through his work, he had a chance encounter with Denis. This triggered another breakdown. He told his wife of 20 years about the abuse, and some work colleagues, who advised him to tell the police. However the police said that Denis was so ill they would not be able to investigate Paddy’s complaint properly.
Paddy describes the impact the sexual abuse has had on his life. He finds it very hard to trust people and has difficulty with friendships and relationships. He suffers from flashbacks and has suicidal thoughts.
He doesn’t want ‘everyone in the world to know what has happened’ to him, and he doesn’t want sympathy. He feels that he ‘just has to live with it’, and although he has bad days, most of the time he is upbeat. He adds that he can’t bear to watch any news about child abuse.
Paddy is glad that since he was abused, more checks have been introduced to protect children, and says they must be rigorous. He feels that it is very important for professionals to be trained in safeguarding and how to spot the signs of abuse. He is also worried about social media sites that make children vulnerable to abuse.
A major concern for Paddy is the ignorance and stigma around child sexual abuse. Through his work, he has heard many people express the belief that males who have been abused will go on to abuse others, and he has feared that he would be judged in this way.
Paddy has had counselling, but did not find this helpful. However, he has good relationships with work colleagues and his wife.