Author Archive

I am looking for a few more reviews of my book “Father Figure – my mission to prevent child sexual abuse” on Amazon. If you are interested in reading this book and writing a review on Amazon, I would be glad to send you a free copy of my book. Please send me an email at [email protected] and let me know if you would be interested in receiving a free copy of my book and writing a review on Amazon (by the way, you would need to have an Amazon account to write a review there). I look forward to hearing from interested individuals.

Reviews on a book are always useful to the author. Various reviewers can come from various different angles and can have interesting perspectives about the messages in the book. This is also another way to bring awareness to this issue of child sexual abuse.

The book is basically a true account story – but the main idea of the story is to bring out the challenges involved in trying to prevent a situation that could possibly lead to abuse. I have made presentations on this topic at several conferences and events and have always received positive remarks about the messages I have tried to express through the true account story.

I am looking forward to my speech at the OSCA (Oregon School Counselors Association) conference in Portland, OR, in Oct 2016. I will be speaking about “Long term psychological impact of bullying”. School counselors typically have a lot of contact with students on a regular basis, and therefore, can have a significant impact in maintaining a safe environment for all students.

My proposed presentation focuses on the fact that a strong emotional health and a positive self-image are key ingredients for academic success. It is not a difficult concept – if on a regular basis a child is concerned about having to deal with negative issues/events/incidents, it is simply not possible for the child to focus on the academic aspects of school life. Interestingly, ALL school staff and parents have a role in this.

In my presentations I often emphasize the fact that “understanding the bully” is one of the key factors that can help immensely in prevention of bullying. I discuss a confrontation I had in my adult years with my worst bully from the past. This very interesting encounter reveals a significant understanding of why bullies do what they do. If we can somehow get to the point of addressing these associated issues, we will make enormous progress in prevention of (and maybe even elimination of) bullying altogether. And ALL school staff (and specifically school counselors) and parents have a role in this – they can all impact the emotional environment for a student.

I was encouraged to note that an organization is looking for ways to maintain a high level of motivation for their child sexual abuse investigators. I think all such organizations need to do this more often. As I discussed in my book, we need highly motivated child sexual abuse investigators so potentially high-risk situations can be investigated more thoroughly and in a timely manner.

Investigating child sexual abuse situations can certainly be extremely stressful. In many situations the likely abuser is someone close to the family – either a family member or a close relative or a friend. That’s what makes it even more stressful. Finding reliable information and following up with family members and friends could be extremely challenging.

It is even more important to maintain high motivation level for child sexual abuse investigators when it comes to a preventive situation – i.e., investigating a situation that could possibly lead to abuse. In these situations it can be very frustrating since there has not yet been a report of an actual abuse. However, we must keep in mind that even one incident of sexual abuse can scar the victim for the rest of his or her life. That is why it is critical that we maintain focus on preventive investigations and provide appropriate training for these investigators for this very critical assignment.

Just recently a reporter (Ruben Rosario) from a major local newspaper (Pioneer Press) called me to write and publish an article on me and my first book “A Life Interrupted – the story of my battle with bullying and obsessive compulsive disorder”. The article was published in last Sunday’s Pioneer Press paper’s ‘Local’ section. In case you are interested, here is the link:

http://www.twincities.com/2016/08/26/rosario-facing-the-bully-and-the-demons-they-spawn/

I am excited about an opportunity to speak to a group of school psychologists at a conference in Grand Forks, ND, in early October. The conference is for the North Dakota Association of School Psychologists (NDASP). I will be speaking about long term psychological impact of bullying, which is a very appropriate topic for school psychologists. They have a key role in the social and emotional development of children while they are in school. Also this will be my first visit to the state of North Dakota.

The main goal of this presentation is to raise the awareness among school psychologists that bullying can have severe long-lasting mental health impact. School administration and staff often believe that once a student (who was a victim of bullying while in school) graduates, there is no impact any more. The purpose of this workshop is to emphasize the fact that for millions of victims of school bullying, that is not the case – in fact, many of them suffer for years because of mental health issues triggered by bullying. It is very likely that if these students had received appropriate guidance and assistance during school years the mental health impact would not have been as severe.

Specifically, the learning objectives are as follows:

• Recognize severe anxiety disorders triggered by PTSD from bullying
• Develop a thorough understanding of the way PTSD from bullying can dictate the development and progression of a mental disorder
• Apply the knowledge gained from this workshop to intervene and assist students who might need help in overcoming developing mental health disorders

In my second book about prevention of child sexual abuse I try to emphasize that one needs to remain vigilant and try to avoid possibly risky situations before something can happen. Because, if one waits until something happens, then it’s already too late.

It is a difficult situation, but unfortunately ‘prevention” means doing something “before” it happens, rather than after. Physical illnesses, for example, can be prevented by appropriate inoculation or other medical preventive measures. But prevention from child sexual abuse requires protecting children from possible harmful situations.

This is certainly not an easy task. It is well known that in many child sexual abuse incidents the abuser is often a close family member or a close family friend. It would likely be difficult to know beforehand if the child is in any danger of abuse. That’s why it is so important to remain vigilant at all times and act on any suspicious behaviors or actions.

We constantly deal with the question of ‘how do we fight against bullying”. There are some who strongly believe that the only way to fight against bullying is to stand up against the bully and get into a physical altercation if necessary. That might work for some victims of bullying, but that does not always work for everyone.

I have met some people who have said that fighting back against the bully (including physical fights) has helped them. On the other hand, I have also heard from some people who have said that it actually made things worse. And of course there is a large number of children who grow up with the belief that you do not get into physical altercations to resolve issues and who do not like fighting.

Overall, the bottom line is that there must be a process to address this issue without leaving it up to the victims to fight it out. Even as adults, we are encouraged to find other ways to handle a “harassment” issue rather than getting into a physical fight. That is why it is so important for schools to develop and maintain a safe environment for all children. All children should be able to feel safe in the school at all times, and know that if they do face any bullying, someone from the school staff will have their back and will make sure it does not happen again.

I just received confirmation that I will be speaking at the WVCA (West Virginia Counseling Association) conference in Daniels, WV, Nov 10-11, 2016. I am excited because I will get a chance to speak in two separate sessions, based on each of my books. The first session will be on “Long lasting psychological impact of bullying” which is based on my book titled “A life interrupted – the story of my battle with bullying and obsessive compulsive disorder”. The topic for the second session will be “Prevention of child sexual abuse – the role of a counselor” which will be based on my second book titled “Father Figure – my mission to prevent child sexual abuse”.

In the first session I will try to emphasize the fact that prolonged bullying can lead to devastating mental disorders that can ruin the victim’s life for many years beyond high school. I do this by describing my life story that focuses on how bullying can trigger a mental health disorder and how it can manifest itself within the disease. Counselors find it interesting and revealing to note the longer term impacts of an unsafe school environment.

In my second session I will try to emphasize the challenges we face in our society when it comes to our efforts in trying to prevent child sexual abuse. I focus on the issues I have described in the true account story in my book, but in addition I also focus on the role counselors can play in detecting a possibly abusive scenario and intervening accordingly.

Long term psychological impact of bullying can be devastating for victims for many years beyond their school years. That is the main message in my first book “A Life Interrupted – the story of my battle with bullying and obsessive compulsive disorder”, and that is what I try to communicate as I speak around the country about these kinds of devastating impacts that can be caused by bullying.

I do find that many school officials and parents around the country do understand that bullying during school years can have continued impact on victims even beyond the school years, but most of them are not quite aware that the impact can be extremely devastating. That is why this is still an issue that needs to be talked about.

At the end of one of my speeches a few months back, a 42-year old man came up to me and shared his story with me. He was bullied a lot during his school years and has had to deal with depression and alcoholism over the last 24 years of his life. He has been trying to get his life back on track, but it continues to be a struggle.

I have heard similar stories from several other individuals whose lives have also been impacted severely because of bullying. We must continue our focus on preventing bullying in our schools and maintaining a safe environment in schools so we can avoid these devastating long term impacts.

While speaking around the country on the topic of prevention of child sexual abuse (CSA), based on my second book “Father Figure – my mission to prevent child sexual abuse, I have met many individuals and service providers who are genuinely interested in and focused on prevention of CSA. That gives me hope that if we continue our efforts, we would see some changes in our systems that will be more effective for prevention.

Many of these individuals are dedicated workers who truly care about the children and their welfare. However, the organizations they work for aren’t always able to focus as much on “prevention” since in most cases there aren’t enough workers who can handle all the immediate crisis situations, and in addition, can also focus on preventive situations. It is often a budget issue as has been discussed before. Hopefully we will see some changes in the near future since many of these workers believe that if they were able to focus more on prevention, many of the actual abuse cases might not have happened.

The good thing is that more and more people are starting to focus on prevention. I have been to several conferences where a large number of sessions have been focused on prevention. Let us hope that this trend continues so we can see some real changes in the near future with many service providers placing greater emphasis on prevention.