Dawn

I froze as they pounced. Hands grabbed at me, gripped onto my school bag. My heart pounding, head swimming, I was dragged through the bushes, losing my footing. In slow motion, I staggered and fell. Winded. Supine. Preadolescent boys standing over me, surrounding me. I looked up at them, eyes wide. I was prey. They savoured the sight of me, then crouched low, one of them reaching for my underwear. I knew this feeling. Time stood still as my mind hurtled through it. Hurtled me back. Shrill, bloodcurdling screams echoed in my head. A siren of panic and terror. Flickers of a masked monster assail me. He is shouting angrily at a bad, despicable, shameworthy little girl, his scowling eyes searing my soul, branding me on the inside. The fog came, blanketed my mind, but in my daze, I knew. I knew I could not bear to see myself as that child again. Lurking dangerously in the recesses of my mind, deeply embedded shame of unbearable intensity. I must preserve my soul. I must be a good girl. A big girl. A brave girl. I must not struggle. Or try to get away. I must not disgrace myself by crying out, for needing to protect my private parts, for needing someone to save me. Shame! Shame upon that child. Just on the other side of the bushes, I could hear the happy chitter-chatter of a group of children passing by. My older siblings would be along soon. A short distance away, an adult was on duty at the pedestrian crossing. A stifled cry lodged in my throat. My little underpants were off. The breeze molested me. My skin crawled under the ogling of eyes. Shame forbade me to utter a sound as the boys leaned in. I must be a big girl. Brave and good. Bees hovered in the grasses. Overhead, birds twittered and chirped as I lay quivering, paralysed, the hard earth pressing into my back, a small vulnerable girl, partially naked, abandoning herself and every self-protective instinct to save herself from awakening the deeply embedded, excruciating shame of her VCUG trauma. You see, this story is less about the boys, than it is about people who could shame innocent children for their need to be safe, while putting them through the traumatic equivalent of violent rape. To the medical profession: This is your legacy. I was a good girl that day. I was big and brave. I was easy prey for the gang of boys who indecently assaulted me that summer afternoon. I was seven. My name is Dawn. I live in New Zealand, and this is the story of the life-altering harms of VCUG in my life. I had a VCUG (known as MCUG or micturating cysto-urethrogram in this part of the world) aged 4. My mind fractured that day. I was never the same again. I got off the table a shadow of the child who woke up that morning with no idea her life was about to change in ways from which she would never recover. I did not have kidney reflux or any urological anomalies. There was zero benefit in the equation. My story is one of pure harm. What happened that summer's day on the way home from school was just one of many sexually violating childhood experiences where the shame of my VCUG disabled all self-protective instincts. Generations of children have been sexually traumatised at the hands of the medical profession, and this is the kind of outcome of that harm in their lives. In every instance, I felt I got off lightly compared to the sexually traumatic horror of my VCUG that I re-lived over and over in flashbacks and nightmares. To my child's mind, the perpetrators were merciful because they did not subject me to the level of unspeakable horror I experienced at the hands of the medical profession, and so I downplayed and minimised their abuses. If the traumatic equivalent of violent rape was accepted for me, how was I to find a way to anything but brushing off less traumatic experiences of sexual violation. Unable to put up any resistance, I was revictimised again and again. I continued to be preyed upon and sexually harassed into my adult life. This is only the beginning of the psychological sequelae of my VCUG. I lived my childhood in absolute terror of it happening again, I could not trust my parents to keep me safe, I was always on guard, hypervigilant to the danger that this could happen again, or to what other unimaginable horrors life had in store. As a preschooler I remember secretly and compulsively checking between dolls legs and being awash with relief to discover the dolls did not have any holes, they could not be penetrated, they were safe, and yet this compulsion invoked such distress, repetitively bringing me face-to-face with my own vulnerability and torment and panic about never being able to arrive at a sense of safety. I longed to be like a doll that had nothing between its legs. In years to come I nearly died of life-threatening anorexia nervosa, hospitalised for many weeks, but the PTSD and shame was so bad I never uttered a word about my trauma to any mental health professional. Later in my teenage years I battled with self-harm, cutting with razor blades to manage my shame. I had to be stitched up and I still bear the scars. I have spent decades living with flashbacks, intrusive thoughts and nightmares, phobia of all things medical, difficulties with emotional regulation, avoidance of relationships, worthlessness, shame, dissociation, aversion to sex, episodes of major depression and suicidal ideation. My sense of safety in the world, my ability to trust myself and others, and my relationship with my mother (profound betrayal is sadly such a common feature of this trauma), were significantly damaged that day. I am soon to turn 54. Fifty years of VCUG trauma. To this day, I live with debilitating PTSD, and significant psychological barriers to accessing healthcare. VCUG trauma nearly cost me my life. It has had a profoundly detrimental impact on my life for half a century. And throughout that half century, the medical profession has persisted with this barbaric practise—subjecting generations of children to the traumatic equivalent of "violent rape", keeping the truth about this harmful procedure buried for decades. The medical community has utterly failed in its ethical and moral duty to safeguard children from known sexual harm being inflicted at their own hands upon legions of children. The lid is being lifted. The truth about this medical sexual assault of children is being brought out of the shadows. There is rising righteous anger. There is a growing public outcry. Shame does not belong to innocent children for needing to be safe. The world will see where the shame belongs.