When you hear the term “child abuse,” you may instinctively imagine adults physically hitting their children or maybe even verbally abusing them. It’s a serious issue that comes in many forms and impacts one million children in the U.S. each year. But a crucial connection with another major childhood adversity remains overlooked, helping perpetuate both issues into the next generation.
This April, National Child Abuse Prevention Month, we can more effectively tackle child abuse by looking at it from a different angle. Knowing these five facts can help you start to make a difference.
1. Childhood Domestic Violence and child abuse are often confused as the same issue
Childhood Domestic Violence (CDV) is often confused with child abuse because it has less than 10 percent awareness, as opposed to child abuse, which has more than 95 percent awareness. Yet CDV impacts 15 million children and 40 million adults in the U.S. CDV is when a person grows up living in a home with domestic violence. From the standpoint of a person in childhood, domestic violence is violence between parents or violence toward a parent — perhaps from a stepparent or significant other.
2. Although they are two separate issues, they are closely connected
There is a definitive understanding that child abuse can often lead to problems in adulthood with relationships, emotions, behaviors, and health. But what is little known is that CDV has a strikingly similar impact. Also, UNICEF calls CDV “the single best predictor of becoming a victim or perpetrator of domestic violence” later in life. And this is key in addressing child abuse. In homes where there is domestic violence, children are physically abused and neglected at a rate 15 times higher than the national average.
3. CDV is a strong contributing factor to child abuse
What these statistics essentially mean is that a child is much more likely to experience child abuse or neglect if at least one of their parents experienced CDV in their childhood home. When we talk about trying to cure lung cancer, we often focus on strong contributing factors, such as smoking. For child abuse, one of these strong contributing factors is Childhood Domestic Violence.
4. Together, these childhood adversities can do serious damage
Evidence also shows that although child abuse and Childhood Domestic Violence, experienced separately, could each cause a significant negative impact in a person’s life, in combination, their cumulative impact can be even worse. Research indicates that when a child experiences both CDV and child abuse together in their childhood home, they tend to fare worse later in life than if they had experienced only one of these adversities in isolation.
5. The good news is, anyone of us can help offset that negative impact
First, by building greater awareness at large of CDV, we can make significant strides in not only curbing CDV but also child abuse. Second, we can step in and become THE ONE for someone who was or is impacted — especially a young person who may currently be experiencing CDV in their childhood home. A caring, supportive adult stepping in with some simple actions and words, to help a child become aware, understand, and share is a critical factor that fosters resiliency. You need not be a child expert to make a difference.
For impacted adults, awareness and education are equally central to helping them connect the dots between what they experienced in childhood and the challenges they face today. Acknowledging it and knowing what to call it — Childhood Domestic Violence or CDV — is an essential first step. Knowing there are resources available to help is the next step. Only then can those who lived with CDV begin to unlearn the negative beliefs learned in childhood and shift the paradigm of their lives.
Brian F. Martin is a marketing entrepreneur as well as the Founder and CEO of the Childhood Domestic Violence Association. Brian is one of the 40 million adults in the U.S. today who grew up living with domestic violence in their childhood home. He is the author of the New York Times best-seller “Invincible,” executive producer of the award-winning documentary “The Children Next Door,” and co-creator of the Emmy-nominated children’s program “Family Secrets.” He is also a regular contributor to the Huffington Post. In addition to testifying before Congress, Brian has been featured on the Dr. Phil show and has appeared in the New York Times, USA Today, The Wall Street Journal, and Forbes.
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