BASSETERRE, St. Kitts – IN recent months, this publication has interviewed a number of females who had suffered through one or more episodes of physical or sexual abuse. And what seems to be a common trend is that these individuals now suffer from severe emotional and trust issues.
But according to a prominent counsellor in the country, these issues could have been mitigated against had the victims sought help before the effects of the incident(s) had taken their toll.
The most recent of the interviewed victims explained that when she was only eight-years-old she was raped several times by her mother’s husband over a one-year period. And as a result she developed an almost irreversible distrust for men.
In an exclusive interview with SKNVibes, Director of Counselling in the Ministry of Social Development Michele Delacoudray-Blake explained that the best case scenario would be for the victim to seek help as soon as possible.
“What counselling can do is start the process of helping the individual deal with these things and find a way to be able to process them and integrate the experience into the fact that it is now a part of you and find a way to live with it. I am not saying that it always works, because sometimes the damage is on-going.”
She said success is sometimes dependent upon when the person gets the help, noting that in cases where the help is sought and provided at an early stage, emotions or issues such as extreme depression, anxiety disorders, interference with interpersonal relationship, and resentment would not have yet taken root.
“If these issues are not dealt with, they are often lifetime issues which follow people throughout their lives. People deal with them in different ways. Sometimes, they self-medicate on drugs and alcohol, sometimes there are emotional problems that go on throughout their lives…
“Tackle the problem as early as possible so that you don’t have post-traumatic stress disorder setting in that goes longer than a particular type of period and it becomes engrained in your experience, which is more difficult to manage.”
For persons who would have waited years before seeking help, Delacoudray-Blake explained that although this poses more of a challenge, it is not too late to seek help.
“We are not saying that hope is lost, but the likelihood is the longer a person lives with it the greater the impact it would have on who you become. It becomes more difficult to manage at that point and to mitigate against the effects of the incident or incidents. Even though it may be caught late in some people, some people have personality strengths that help them through a situation and that help them to remain resilient. Some people have a belief system which helps them. There is no situation where hope is really lost but there are some that are more difficult than others.
