The two boys who were kidnapped in Missouri are making the news — on nearly every station. I watched Oprah’s interview of the families of the boys yesterday, and I heard The View comment on them as well. Many people appear mystified as to why the boys didn’t run away or get help — when they were given the freedoms to surf the web, play with friends, ride their bikes, etc.

We all naturally feel deep inside if we were held against our will in any way, we’d run as soon as we could get away. That’s a natural thought process when you are free, and when you are an adult. But people are not adding to the mix several factors.

First, these are children, impressionable children. I believe when these boys were taken, they were threatened, and the children took those threats very seriously. When an adult stranger says in a very strict tone to a child that he is going to kill him and his family if he talks, or tries to escape — and then he is taken to unfamiliar places, his family doesn’t rescue him and he is isolated from anyone he knew — that child will believe that stranger.

I’ll bet 99% of children in that situation would be instilled with paralyzing fear to NOT act against the aggressor in any way, shape or form. But more than that– when these boys were likely victimized by what I suspect is a pedophile — the pedophile had an even tighter grip. Here is why…

Once a child has been forced to participate in anything he knows is not right, bad, or unacceptable — even though the child didn’t invite the problem — he still feels shame for what has happened. A child will also feel shame for whatever occurs (sexual crimes, etc.) and some may feel guilty for going with the stranger, for not fighting off the stranger, for listening to the stranger, for following the commands of the stranger (whatever those are), for positive feelings they felt in a negative situation. The more disturbing the act done to the child– the more the child will feel negative emotions pushing him deeper into silence.

These feelings of shame, guilt, and even pleasure at times will keep a child captive and even more afraid to speak up. It’s not to say that the child doesn’t know what is going on is wrong. Often times they do — but their natural feelings of shame, guilt and fear override their logic. Internal fear of having to face what happened shuts them down even further.

It’s much like a child who is sexually abused in their own home. Why don’t they speak up??

They see their parents, teachers, friends, neighbors every day — but most often the victimized children never seek out any help until someone else notices it. This situation shares many parallels to children who are kidnapped and abducted. Now, imagine all the isolation and power of an abduction. Add back in the paralyzing fear of a stranger threatening to kill you and your family and the lack of support from being removed from everything you ever knew. You will have a child held prisoner without any walls.

Furthermore, children don’t rationalize like we do as adults — that they shouldn’t feel shame — even though they do. They don’t rationalize that they didn’t invite the problem and that it is not their fault. Even some adults when victimized can’t help but feel shameful, dirty, fearful and sometimes even partially to blame — when they logically know they did nothing to provoke an attack. Even adults aren’t always able to override and rationalize their emotional feelings — so we certainly can’t expect that of children.

I hope people go easy on these children. I hope I can somehow help people understand some of the feelings these boys encountered and why they reacted the way they did. The boys need time to heal and understand that they did nothing wrong — that instead they encountered a very sick and twisted man.

When I watched Shawn Hornbeck on Oprah yesterday, I could clearly see the dichotomy of his emotions on his face. People are giving him a standing ovation, they are proud of him for making it through — and while he is happy to free and back home — he also feels tremendous shame, insecurity, and negativity. Instead of feeling all happy inside, Shawn mostly feels violated, and ashamed about what he went through — and to see all this happiness in his despair doesn’t make sense emotionally to him. Logically, I think Shawn understands it — but emotionally the pull is too strong and too difficult to make sense of and then the confusion sets in.

Shawn’s healing — as with all people victimized by crime — will depend on his ability to delineate logic from his emotional responses. If he can differentiate his emotional feelings from the logical facts — he will start to heal. He will realize this attack had nothing to do with him, was a random act of violence and that violence of this sort is rare — which is so much easier said then done. If he allows his emotions to control him, he will face continued turmoil. This is true for much of people’s heartaches in life.

Shawn also has to look at the world now and realize just because people are nice — and pleasant looking — doesn’t mean there isn’t a monster lurking underneath. The trust issues Shawn and Ben will face in life will be huge.

My heart goes out to them.

********************
On that note, I have seen Bill O’Reilly’s response to the news about the boys — and he is saying that he thinks Shawn Hornbeck liked his stay with the suspected pedophile. This comment from Mr. O’Reilly doesn’t surprise me — because Mr. O’Reilly can’t read emotions in people. He is what I call a ‘literalist’. He takes everything at face value. He only sees black and white. Mr. O’Reilly is color-blind.