One way you can tell that an adult is a CSA survivor is that they talk nonstop about protecting children and keeping them safe. It isn’t once in a while or every other day. It’s a flood.
And it’s clear how they’re coping with unbearable trauma: they try to stop that same trauma from happening to others. One of the things CSA survivors wrestle with is whether it was their fault. And indeed, in the Jewish community, many were blamed.
I distinctly remember survivors being branded as crazy, troubled. “They wanted it.” “They’re not pure.” “They come from bad families.” You name it, it was thrown at the survivors.
So the survivors were victimized, then victimized again. “You imagined it.” Every sort of hurtful and cruel thing that can be said to a trauma survivor was thrown at them by the frum community. Not because the frum community truly believed these things, but because the priority was protecting the men who were accused and the institutions they worked for — yeshivas, camps, and so on.
What we learn on the holiday of Shavuot is that Hashem ultimately and always takes care of us. It is not up to the survivor of child sexual abuse to stop abuse from happening to other children. There is a God.
God gave us a rule book, a playbook. Some of us are doing better than others at keeping its laws. But as Shavuot approaches, it’s a reminder that we can trust that the One who gave us the Torah — Hashem — will ultimately make things right in a way everyone can see.
Writing by Dr. Dannielle Blumenthal 