Ask Megan: Is the sexual behavior of my 6-year-old child unusual?

Tracy  asks: Dear Megan, PLEASE HELP !

My grandson Anthony who is 6, is living with us (me and my husband). Anthony’s dad is  my 23-year-old son. We recently had to kick him out of our house, hoping to wake him up, because we found a crack pipe, a weed scale, a spoon with cotton on it, obviously used for shooting up, and we warned him not to bring any of that stuff in our house when he came. Since my son had nowhere to go but to random friends’ houses to stay, we told him to leave Anthony with us so he could get to school every day. We have been taking total care of our grandson since. My son’s behavior hasn’t gotten any better so we went to the courthouse and got emergency custody of Anthony for fear my son would come get him and drag him out of school with nowhere to live. My son has no job or a car.

Anthony’s mother is in state prison for the second time now in 5 years, drugs, thefts, altering a prescription for pain pills, bad checks. Anthony’s life with them has not been good: moving from school to school,3 times in kindergarten, now re-taking kindergarten, moving from house to house, having several addresses over 5 years and witnessing a lot of bad fighting and arguing every week between mom and dad. Mom gets out in May of 2013. We know the past cycles will all start again. My husband and I have had enough, we are suing them both for custody until they both can become stable, have jobs to provide properly, stay in one place for at least a year to provide stability for our grandson, be drug free and learn to get along better so the boy doesn’t have to watch that fighting going on.

THE PROBLEM WE HAVE JUST NOTICED IS, the past few days we have caught Anthony with my thong underwear, several pairs stuffed down his pants. We caught him in the bathroom with one of my nighties on and the breast area stuffed with my underwear. This just started and I feel something is very wrong. I had 6 children myself, and none ever went through anything like that. What could be the cause of such behavior from a 6-year-old boy? Just going through a curiosity phase? Doing that odd behavior because he is feeling a lot of stuff inside like loneliness for his mom and dad, confusion, questions as to why and what’s going on, or anger, and he just doesn’t know how to get/express these feelings out, or know how and what to do to deal with how he is feeling? What do you find with this type of behavior and what can we do to help? THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR YOUR TIME WITH THIS QUESTION.

Tracy, I hope you’re reading this because the email I sent you came back as undeliverable. Lady, you have had your hands full, first with raising six kids, then with the drug and legal issues with your son and Anthony’s mom, and now with raising your little grandson! I appreciate your trusting me with your story and for seeking my advice. Since you’re asking me about Anthony’s latest behavior, I will answer that, but I think you may need a little more help than just with that.

While it is perfectly within the normal range for children to experiment with their sexuality, and they can start exhibiting signs of curiosity as early as age 3 or 4, it becomes a little more problematic when they exhibit unusual sexual behavior (not just exploring their own bodies with simply touching themselves) and when the sexual behavior is done with someone else. The reason why the latter is concerning is that, generally, children who are abused tend to repeat that same behavior with other children (touching others in the same inappropriate ways they were). I don’t think that stuffing panties down his pants, in the bathroom where he thought he would be alone, is cause for alarm. However, in the off-chance that there was more to it than what you saw, you’d have every reason to be cautious. Considering his hectic childhood, and his teenage, drug-addicted parents’ erratic behavior, I wouldn’t want to dismiss abuse altogether either, not because I think it happened, but because it could have.

Let me be clear: Based on what you’ve seen and told me, I think that Anthony’s sexual behavior with your underwear is not all that unusual but I do think that Anthony’s erratic childhood warrants a little more scrutiny. He needs more than just a talk about how sexuality should be cherished but private, and that you do not find it acceptable for him to play with your underwear.

Anthony has been through a lot of confusing events for a six-year-old, and even though he is in a stable, loving situation now, with adults who model better behavior for him to imitate, hopefully with a consistent routine to restore his sense of safety and control, I would want him to see a professional, so he is helped now rather than later with more serious behavioral issues. I urge you to have him see the school or district psychologist or counselor, or another mental health professional if you prefer, not so much for the underwear issue but to explore other issues he may have.

I hope this helps, Tracy. I’m here if you need to discuss this further.

What do you think, dear reader? What would you tell Tracy?

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